Entertainment venues in Chongqing where customers might be able to pay for sex will be fined or shut if they fail to provide condoms.

The pioneering move has come as authorities in the Southwest China municipality fight to stop the spread of HIV, a local newspaper reported yesterday,

The project was launched on Tuesday by the Disease Control and Prevention Centre (CDC) of Chongqing in five districts and counties, to spread the use of condoms in all entertainment places, which usually refers to hotels, massage centres and karaoke halls.

By the end of June, Chongqing had 2,222 HIV/AIDS sufferers, 12.7 per cent of whom became infected through unsafe sex, Chongqing Times reported.

For example, in Jiulongpo District there are at least 1,000 such entertainment places. And a secret investigation by local disease control workers found that in 441 of them customers were able to pay for sex.

According to the project, local disease control experts and workers will give training courses on HIV/AIDS control to managers of the places.

After training, the managers will sign a contract with the local government to ensure that condoms are available.

According to the contract, these entertainment places must make condoms easily available, for free or for sale, in rooms where sex might happen.

And disease control officials will check that the rules are adhered to. If not, the places will be warned, fined and even closed down.

Unsafe sex, which usually occurs between prostitutes and their clients, caused half of the 70,000 HIV/AIDS cases reported in 2005 on the Chinese mainland.

In 2004, six departments under the State Council, including the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Public Security, jointly issued a national programme on wider condom use.

Prior to the programme only a few pilot projects encouraged the wider use of condoms, as prostitution is illegal in China.

Police usually take the condom as evidence of sex happening in hotels or other entertainment places.

Both prostitutes and clients will be detained for about 15 days or be fined, and bosses will also be punished.

However, police supervision and punishment has failed to curb the sex industry. In fact, the ratio of HIV infection through unsafe sex has continued to increase in the country. There are now 650,000 HIV/AIDS suffers in China.

With this in mind, the central government asked its public security departments to stop punishing the owners of these places if they find condoms.

And according to the State Council's control strategy against HIV/AIDS in the next five years, issued early this year, the programme will gradually spread across the country.

(China Daily 09/07/2006 page2)