The problem with this cart before the horse theory (oops!) is that it took the US gay community and the bathhouse owners many years before anything was done about publicising the risk of unprotected sex.

If you read Randy Shilts' excellent history of the origins of HIV Aids "And The Band Played On", in Chapter 41 you'll see that bathhouse owners had deeply retrenched attitudes about co-operating with anyone. In 1984 when the facts about the virus were very clear, they even condemned the "uncaring and unscrupulous theocrats (who) have stooped to manipulate public fears about AIDS in order to serve their own private, political goals of eliminating first the gay baths, then the gay bars, then . . ."

But it was not only the religious right. Dr James Curran of the Centres for Disease Control said, "I wish the gay commuunity would officially express concern over bathhouses. I'd like to see all bathhouses go out of business . . Gay men need to know that if they're going to have promiscuous sex, they'll have a life expectancy of people in the developing world."

I grant you that eventually the bathhouse owners did come round to the need to actively promote AIDS awareness and safe sex - but only after thousands had died and huge numbers of bathhouses been forced to close.

Totally agree with you. However, as highlighted in my first post on this thread and well known by anyone who reads the newspapers here, there seem to be many within the government who do not know (perhaps "choose not to know" is a more appropriate description) the importance of promoting condom use within the gay community. Expecting the government to do anything is therefore meaningless at this stage.

I once read of politics being described as the art of the possible. I believe the same can be applied to fighting HIV AIDS in Thailand. There's little point saying "the government should do this" or "educational authorities should do that". The fact is that in a deeply conservative society like Thailand they just ain't going to do it - at least not until international media exposure threatens tourism.

Similarly, from my limited understanding of the way gay saunas are operated, owners are not going to co-operate in spreading the safe sex message - unless they see a threat to their livelihoods. This is partly the shock therapy I believe Khun Natee is now administering.

Finally, whilst again totally agreeing with your basic premise, stillthrobbing, I just do not believe we should stand on the sidelines mouthing worthy slogans while many dozens of gay saunas around the country catering mostly to young Thai guys in their late teens and twenties do nothing to prevent what seems to be a vast increase in unprotected sex. As we know, they are gambling with their lives. The question is: how, realistically and practically, do we get them to realise that?

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