How Mr. Condom made Thailand a better place Mechai Viravaidya

[Music]

[Music]

welcome to Thailand now when I was a

young man 40 years ago the country is

very very poor with lots and lots and

lots of people living in poverty we

decided to do something about it but we

didn’t begin with the welfare program or

a poverty reduction program but we began

with a family planning program following

a very successful maternal child health

activity sets of activities so basically

no one would accept family planning if

that children didn’t survive

so the first step get to the children

get to the mothers and then follow up

with family planning not just child

mortality alone you need also Family

Planning now let me take you back as to

why we needed to do it in my country

that was the case in 1974 seven children

four family tremendous growth at three

point three percent

there was just no future we needed to

reduce the poverty interest rate so we

said let’s do it the women said we agree

we’ll use pills but we need a doctors to

prescribe the pills and we had very very

few doctors so we didn’t take no as an

answer we took no as a question so we

went to the nurses and the midwives who

were also women and did a fantastic job

at explaining how to use the pill that

was wonderful but it covered only 20% of

the country what do we do for the other

80% leave them alone and say well

they’re not medical personnel no we

decided to do a bit more so we went to

the ordinary people that you saw

actually below that yellow sign I wish

they hadn’t wiped that because there was

Coca Cola that

we were so much bigger than coca-cola in

those days and no difference the people

they chose were the people we chose

they’re well known in the community they

knew that customers who always right and

they were terrific and they practiced

their family planning themselves so they

could supply pills and condoms

throughout the country in every village

of the country so there we are we went

to the people who were seen as the cause

of the problem to be the solution so

wherever there were people and you can

see much from the women selling things

here’s the floating market selling

bananas and crabs and also

contraceptives wherever you find people

you will find contraceptives in Thailand

and then we decided why not get to

religion because in the Philippines the

Catholic Church was pretty strong and

type he were Buddhist so we went to them

and they said look could you help us so

I’m there the one in blue not the yellow

holding a ball of holy water for the

monk to sprinkle holy water on pills and

condoms for the sanctity of the family

and this picture was sent throughout the

country so some of the monks in the

villages were doing the same thing

themselves and the women was saying no

wonder we have no side effects it’s been

rest that was that perception and then

we went to teachers you need you need

everybody to be involved in trying to

provide whatever it is that makes

humanity a better place so we were to

the teachers over quarter of a million

were taught about family planning with

new alphabet a v Ferber C for condom

either I or D Viva vasectomy and then we

had a snakes and ladders game when you

throw dice if you land on anything Pro

Family Planning you move ahead like

mother takes the pill every night put

very good mother move it uncle buys

condom very good uncle move ahead and

who gets Stranglers use condom come back

that again

again education class entertainment and

their kids were doing it in schools too

we had real iterations with condoms

we had children’s condom blowing

championship and before long the condom

was known as the girl’s best friend in

Thailand for poor people diamonds don’t

make it so the condom is the girl’s best

friend we introduced our first

microcredit program in 1975 and the

women who organized it said we only want

to lend to women who practice family

planning if you’re pregnant take care of

your pregnancy if you’re not pregnant

you can take a load not from us and that

was run by them and after 35 36 years

it’s still going on it’s part of the

village Development Bank it’s not a real

Bank but so fun

microcredit and we didn’t need a big

organization to run it we were run by

the villages themselves and you probably

hardly seen a Thai man there it’s always

women women women women and then we

thought we’d help America because

America has been helping everyone

whether they want help or not

[Applause]

and this is on the 4th of July we

decided to provide resecting me to all

men but in particular American men to

the front of the queue rideable to the

ambassador’s residence during his Van

Daan and the Hotel gave us the ballroom

for it

very appropriate room and since it was

near lunchtime they said alright we’ll

give you some lunch of course it must be

American : you’ve got two brands Coke

and Pepsi and then the food

it’s either hamburger or hotdog and I

thought a hotdog would be more symbolic

and and here is this then young man for

Willy boom who worked for USAID

obviously he’s had this perspective me

because his hotdogs half-eaten and he

was very happy it made a lot of news in

America and it angered some people also

I said don’t worry come over I’ll do the

whole lot of you and what happened you

know all this thing from 7 children to

1.5 children population growth rate of

3.3 to 0.5 you could call it the Coca

Cola approach if you like it was exactly

the same thing I’m not sure what a Coca

Cola followed us so we followed Coca

Cola but we’re good friends and so

that’s the case of everyone joining in

we didn’t have a strong government we

didn’t have lots of doctors but it’s

everybody’s job who can change attitude

and behavior then age came along and hit

Thailand and we had to stop doing a lot

of good things to fight AIDS but

unfortunately the government was in

denial denial denial so I work wasn’t

effective so I thought well if you can’t

go to the government go to the military

so I went to the military and ask to

borrow three hundred grey do stations

they have more than the government and

they got more guns than the government

so I asked him could they help us in our

fight against HIV and after I gave them

statistics they said yes okay you can

use all the radio stations television

stations and that’s when we went onto

the airwaves and then we had a new prime

minister soon after that and he said

I could you come and join he asked

me in because he liked my wife a lot so

I said ok he became the chairman of

National AIDS committee and increased

the budget 50 for every ministry even

judges had to be involved with AIDS

education everyone and we said the

public institutions religious

institutions schools everyone was

involved and here every media person had

to be trained for HIV and we gave every

station half a minute extra for

advertising to earn more money so they

were happy with that and then AIDS

education in all schools starting from

University and these are high school

kids teaching high school kids and the

best teachers were the girls not the

boys and they were terrific and these

girls who go around teaching about safe

sex and HIV were known as mother Teresa

and then we went down one more step

these are primary school kids third

fourth grade going to every household in

the village every household in the whole

of Thailand hearing aids information and

a condom - every household given by

these young kids and no parents objected

because we were saved trying to save

lives and this was a life saver

and we said everyone needs to be

involved so you have the companies also

realizing that six start on work and

debt customers don’t buy so they all

trade and then we have this captain

condom with his Harvard MBA going to

schools and nice spots and they’d have

to you need a symbol of something you

know in every country every program you

need a symbol and this is probably the

best thing he’s ever done with MBA

and then we gave condoms up everywhere

in the street everywhere everyone in

taxis you get condoms and also in

traffic the policemen give you hundred

our cops-and-robbers program so can you

imagine New York policemen giving out

calm down of course I can and they’d

enjoy it immensely I’d see them standing

around right now everywhere imagine if

they had come down that’s giving out to

all sorts of people and then your new

change we had hair ban clothing and the

condom for your mobile phone during the

rainy season and these were the condoms

that we introduced one says weapon of

mass protection we found you know

somebody here was searching for the

weapon of mass destruction well we have

found the weapon of mass protection the

condom and then it says here with the

American flag don’t leave home without

it

but I have some to give out afterwards

but let me warn you these are tie size

so be very careful

and so so you can sue you can see that

condoms can condoms can do so many

things look at this I give this to Al

Gore and to build senior also stop

global warming use condoms and then this

is the picture I mentioned to you that

the weapon of mass protection and let

the next Olympics save some lives why

just run around and then and then

finally in Thailand where Buddhists we

don’t have a God so instead we say in

rubber we trust so you can see that we

added everything to I endeavor to make

life better for the people we had

condoms in all the refrigerators in the

hotels in the schools because alcohol

impairs judgment and then what happened

after all this time everybody joined in

according to the UN it declined by new

cases of HIV declined by 90% and

according to the World Bank seven point

seven million lives were saved otherwise

there wouldn’t be many Thais walking

around today so just showed you you

could do something about it

90 percent of the funding came from

Thailand there was political commitment

some financial commitment and everybody

joined in the fight so just don’t leave

it to the specialists and doctors and

nurses we all need to help and then we

decided to help people out of poverty

now that we got it’s somewhat out of the

way this time not with government alone

but in cooperation with the business

community because poor people are

business people who lack business skills

and access to credit those are the

things to be provided by the business

community we’re trying to turn them into

barefoot entrepreneurs little business

people the only way out of poverty is

through business enterprise so that was

done so the money goes from the company

into the village via tree planting so

it’s not a free gift they plant the

trees and the money goes into their

microcredit fund which we call the

village development back everybody joins

in and they feel they own the bank

because they’ve brought the money in and

before that you can borrow the money you

can need to be trained and we believe in

what will help the poor those are living

in poverty access to credit must be a

human right access to credit

mas

human right otherwise they’ll never get

out of poverty and then before getting

alone

you must be trained here’s a what we

call a barefoot MBA teaching people how

to do business so that when they borrow

our money they’ll succeed with the

business so these are some of the

Bissell’s mushrooms crabs vegetables

trees fruits and this very interesting

nike ice cream and Nike biscuits this is

a village sponsored by Nike

they said they should stop making shoes

and clothes make these better because we

can afford them and then we have silk

tie silk now we’re making Scottish

patents as you can see on the left to

sell to all people or Scottish ancestors

so anyone sitting in and watching TV can

in touch with me and then this is our

answer to Starbucks in Thailand coffee

and condoms see Starbucks keeps you

awake we keep you awake and alive can

you imagine at every Starbucks that you

can also get condoms so you can order

your countdown to the cappuccino and

then now finally in education we want to

change the school as being underutilized

into a place where it’s a lifelong

learning center for everyone we call

this our school-based integrated rural

development and it’s a center a focal

point for economic and social

development so we do the school make it

serve the community needs and here is a

bamboo building all of them are bamboo

this is a geodesic dome made of bamboo

and I’m sure Buckminster Fuller would be

very very proud to see a bamboo geodesic

dome and we use vegetables around the

school ground so they raise their own

vegetables and then finally I firmly

believe if we want the MDGs to work the

Millennium Development Goals we need to

add family planning to it of course our

mortality first and then family planning

everyone needs family planning service

it’s underutilized so we have now found

the weapon of mass protection and we

also ask the next Olympics to be

involved in saving lives and then

finally that is our network and these

are tide tulips

thank you very much indeed

[Applause]