Condoms on the menu: A fight against AIDS

By Emma Cameron

JAKARTA (JP): Next time you stay at the Shangri-la Hotel in Surabaya and you're feeling a bit peckish why not order a condom through room service.

The recognition that human appetites do not stop at food and drink has made the Shangri-la Hotel the only hotel to win one of eight AIDS Awards for 1999.

The Awards, currently in their third year are sponsored by the Kusuma Buana Foundation, UNAIDS and Apindo. The Awards give recognition to companies that work to promote AIDS awareness to their workers and the wider community. The targeting of companies as recipients of the awards is deliberate, given that almost 80 percent of HIV/AIDS cases occur in the productive 20 to 49 year age group.

Director for Health Care at the Kusuma Buana Foundation, Adi Sasongko, believes that the AIDS epidemic, if not stopped at this early stage in Indonesia, will destroy the already fragile economy.

"Our geographical situation makes us different to India and Thailand (who contained a growing AIDS threat) ... and our ethnic groupings will make it impossible for us to survive."

The current number of registered AIDS/HIV cases in Indonesia is 1014, with five more cases of AIDS and four more cases of HIV recorded in November.

The prevalence of AIDS among this productive age group has been put down to the 3M phenomenon (Mobile Man with Money), which makes hotels an ideal place to spread the message of safe sex.

The idea was initiated by the General Manager of the Shangri- la Surabaya, Peter Carmichael, in 1998. As well as providing condoms through room service, posters and current information on HIV/AIDS have been displayed and information days on sexually transmitted diseases, human reproduction, behavior change and public awareness are held once every three months with experts in the field.

The training sessions for staff have proved a success with some sessions over the two days extending from their scheduled three hours to five hours.

Novia Herdiana, a representative for Shangri-la Surabaya, is proud of the award and adamant about the importance of AIDS awareness, especially among hotels. "We have to have this kind of thing, all our guests are coming from other countries. We don't know who they are," she said.

Care was taken to remain inoffensive with their awareness campaign however, with condoms placed on the menu rather than directly in the room. With bibles in each room, Shangri-la feels they are sensitive to the needs of all.

Novia did not feel that providing condoms would offend religious guests "I'm also Muslim. I mean, come on, you provide condoms. What does that mean, you also provide women?"

Not all companies are willing to risk their reputation however. Sasongko often faces difficulties in convincing companies to host AIDS awareness campaigns with managers thinking if they do then their customers might suspect there are HIV/AIDS carriers in the company. Managers also choose to turn a blind eye, believing religious convictions will be enough to prevent promiscuity and AIDS.

"I talked to one manager in one company in Bogor who said 'my people are good people, they perform religious acts. They don't need it'," Sasongko said.

Freeport Indonesia in Timika, Irian Jaya, was another company to receive the award this year -- the only mining company to receive the honor.

The program was developed as part of the public health and malaria control department and was included for fairly obvious reasons. "There are quite a number of single men working in the mine, we have to give them information to be more careful in their out of work activities," said Siddhartha Moersjid, a public relations manager at the company.

With the majority of the 6000 workers in Irian Jaya being single males, sex workers are abundant in the area. The campaign was largely carried out through the distribution of a comic type booklet that told the miners the effects of AIDS and how they could be avoided.

The current criteria for the award is to provide ongoing AIDS awareness services with awards going to different companies each year. However with the participation of UNAIDS this year, the plan is for the award to be ongoing so that companies who continue their awareness programs will be eligible every year.

What the awards sponsors hope for now is for the works that these companies do to be enshrined in policy. There are plans to give a gold medal award to those companies who not only consistently provide information to their workers on HIV/AIDS but state a commitment to the program in their formal policy.

A large number of the award recipients are also foreign investors currently working for local contractors, such as previous years winners Nike and Levi Strauss.

A commitment to health issues from local companies has increased with the easing of the economic crisis. Companies with skilled workers are also more willing to invest in their workers long-term future.

"The companies with unskilled workers response is not very good. If they have problems they just fire them and they have hundreds of people lining up to take their place," Sasongko said.

The six other award recipients for 1999 were Citra Abadi Sejati in Cileungsi, West Java (garment manufacturer), Eratex Djaja in Probolinggo, East Java (garments and textiles), Freshtex Garment in Karawang, West Java (finishing and laundry for jeans), Masterindo Jaya Abadi in Bandung, West Java (garments), Nutrifood in Kawasan Industri Pulogadung, Jakarta (food) and Wearwel International in Tanjung Priok, Jakarta (garments).