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Population
(TIME: JANUARY 2, 1989)
He is a champion of condoms. a pusher of the Pill, a voice for vasectomies-and a major reason that the annual rate of Thailand's population growth was cut in half, from 3.2% to 1.6% in just I5 years. And while he sometimes comes across as an energetic public relations man with a bagful of gimmicks, Mechai Viravaidya, 47, the engineer of Thailand's remarkable drive to curb its birthrate, regards population control as serious business.
In 1974 Mechai, a former government economist, launched a private nonprofit organization, now known as the Population and Community Development Association (P.D.A.) to foster family planning and distribute birth control devices. With growing encouragement and financial support from the government, the Bangkok-based P.D.A. has made population control a national mission. Today some 70% of Thailand's couples practice family planning. Mechai estimates that without his program Thailand's population, currently 54 million, would have grown to 64 million.
He began by touting condoms-now commonly called mechais in Thailand. "Wherever there was a crowd. we would be there handing them out:' says Me- chai. "Movie theaters, traffic jams-we tried to turn every event into a family-planning session." With humor and showmanship. Mechai has judged condom-blowing contests and has shown how to use condoms as tourniquets. Each New Year's Eve, the P.D.A. gives traffic police boxes of prophylactics to distribute in a "cops and rubbers" program.
While continuing to hand out condoms, Mechai has helped couples move on to more sophiisticated forms of contraception. He put birth control supermarkets" in bus terminals, offering Pills. IUDs and spermicidal foam as well as condoms. Mechai also opened vasectomy clinics across the country, including one in Bangkok's massage-parlor district. Each year on the King's birthday. the P.D.A. offers free vasectomies (normal price: $20) The campaign has brought about a profound change in the way Thais look at their families. The proof is in millions of people like Bocnya Nuen- mun. 36, a farmer in Korat province. Though his parents had nine children. Nuenmun says. "I've got two daughters. and that's enough already. I've been practicing birth control for years.
