The United Nation's Aids agency in Thailand is alarmed over the disappearance of free condoms from gay saunas since the launch of the government's social order campaign.

Owners of gay saunas in Thailand, which have been repeatedly raided by Thai police since the crackdown began, stopped handing out free condoms to sauna visitors, scared they could be used as evidence against the sauna owners, if they were charged with operating sex establishments.

Anything that hinders access to tools for Aids prevention jeopardizes the whole AIDS-HIV program in Thailand, said Doctor Swarup Sarkar, Thailand's program development adviser for UN Aids.

There are currently more than 21 known gay saunas and 255 gay venues in Bangkok, with each of them having hundreds of visitors every day.

Doctor Sarkar is also concerned that the war on drugs in Thailand has driven intravenous drug users beyond the reach of Thailand's public health workers. The Thai ministry estimates the rate of HIV infection among intravenous drug users in Thailand is currently more than 41%.

The disappearance of free condoms in Bangkok's gay saunas comes at a time when the Thai Public Health Ministry is beginning to face up with a growing new Aids epidemic among gay and bisexual men in Thailand.

Thailand hopes to have its first-ever HIV/Aids program for gay and bisexual men up and running before the World Aids conference which starts in Bangkok on July 2004. A taskforce at Thailand's Public Health Ministry is designing a new strategy to fight HIV/Aids gay Thai men and gay sauna visitors.

This new strategy would be the first of its kind in Asia, where public health officials are reluctant to address HIV/AIDS issues relating to gay and bisexual men. In the past, there has been a silence about the Aids epidemic among gay men in Thailand and Asia, said Doctor Sarkar.

Khun Taweesap said that Thailand's new strategy would be to set up a clinic specifically for gay and bisexual men be set up in at the Bangrak Hospital in Bangkok, as well as funding for gay and bisexual health groups in Thailand.

This new taskforce in Thailand was set up after study conducted earlier this year, exposed that 17.3% of gay and bisexual men in Bangkok were HIV positive. The study was the first of its kind in Thailand, conducted in April and May 2003 at 16 of the 255 gay venues in Bangkok identified by the researchers.

Thai researchers tested 1,121 men for HIV and interviewed them. They found an alarming rate of unsafe sexual practices in the gay venues, while a significant number of the Thai gay workers surveyed said they had had sex with women as well as with men.

44% of the gay sex-workers had unsafe sex during the preceding 6 months. More than one third (36 per cent) said they also had regular sexual intercourse with a woman. Most of the Thai men working in gay venues are young, with the average age being 26.9 years. Those aged 18 to 22 were tested twice as likely to be HIV positive.

Khun Taweesap said that Thailand was preparing for a significant increase of gay and bisexual male Aids patients in the next five years to come.