
All Hail the Condom King - mhb
https://www.gatesnotes.com/Health/Heroes-in-the-Field-Mechai-Viravaidya
======
jaredandrews
Back in college I had the great fortune of going to Thailand for 3 months and
working for Mechai's non-profit. The man is a legend for real and this article
barely scratches the surface. While it started with condoms his organization
has done so much more since.

My student group worked with Thai students and we visited villages where the
PDA had installed solar powered water pumps. We were basically tasked with
checking in and seeing how it was going.

The whole experience really changed my perspective on a lot of things.
Mechai's approach is based on empowering communities instead of telling them
what to do. And guess what? It works.

As a bonus, here is a picture of me with an anthropomorphic condom I met at a
Cabbage's & Condoms restaurant:
[https://imgur.com/a/pRnCrh9](https://imgur.com/a/pRnCrh9)

Also, Mechai's TED Talk is worth checking out:
[https://www.ted.com/talks/mechai_viravaidya_how_mr_condom_ma...](https://www.ted.com/talks/mechai_viravaidya_how_mr_condom_made_thailand_a_better_place?language=en)

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js2
Meanwhile in Mississippi, public school educators have had to resort to
teaching kids how to put on socks[1] due to state legislation disallowing
condom demonstrations[2,3].

1\. [https://youtu.be/06kT9yfj7QE](https://youtu.be/06kT9yfj7QE)

2\.
[https://law.justia.com/codes/mississippi/2013/title-37/chapt...](https://law.justia.com/codes/mississippi/2013/title-37/chapter-13/sex-
and-abstinence-education/section-37-13-171)

3\. [https://mississippitoday.org/2016/03/29/mississippi-
extends-...](https://mississippitoday.org/2016/03/29/mississippi-extends-
abstinence-based-sex-ed/)

~~~
JohnJamesRambo
All that is human must retrograde if it does not advance. - Edward Gibbon

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jseliger
Gates also has interest in condoms as a technology:
[http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/science/201...](http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/science/2015/04/latex_condoms_are_the_worst_why_after_all_these_years_don_t_we_have_a_better.html)

 _Resnic is not the only one who has been trying to build a better condom. In
November 2013, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation began distributing
$100,000 grants to teams of researchers who’d submitted proposals for “the
Next Generation of Condom.” The Gates Foundation hopes that at least one of
the grantees will develop a product that men in the developing world want to
use, which will consequently have “substantial benefits for global health,
both in terms of reducing the incidence of unplanned pregnancies and in
prevention of infection with HIV or other STIs.” The winning proposals include
Resnic’s; a condom made of graphene, which is a form of carbon that’s a single
atom thick; a condom incorporating plant-based antioxidants; and an “ultra-
sheer wrapping condom” made of polyethylene, a type of plastic often used in
packaging. Meanwhile, in 2014 a California inventor raised more than $100,000
on the crowdfunding site IndieGoGo to develop the Galactic Cap, a condom
designed to fit snugly on the head of the penis while leaving the shaft bare._

I don't know what's happened since 2013, though; there do not seem to be any
readily available updates in the last couple years.

~~~
justinator
According to the Galactic Cap website[0], they're looking for $500,000 to go
through clinic trials. ...although they're taking orders on their site? That
seems... weird. Each condom is $20. Hopefully the price will go down.

Also, careful of that video. I never would have thought I'd see a Fleshlight
and a dildo together, but: there you go.

[0] [http://galacticcap.com](http://galacticcap.com)

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kposehn
> When people in Thailand want a condom, they don’t call it a condom. Instead,
> they refer to it by the name of the man who taught them the importance of
> using one—they ask for a “Mechai.”

In Thai culture as I understand it this is indeed quite an honor. What an
achievement.

~~~
chickenfries
What is something else in Thai that is referred to in a similar way?

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exelius
I remember last time I went to Bangkok, there was a condom themed restaurant
that was pretty good. It was on the first floor of the ministry of health,
which I thought was pretty interesting.

Still a really weird concept for a restaurant though.

~~~
village-idiot
Fantastic concept if your primary goal is making the subject non-taboo rather
than selling lots of food.

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netcan
A couple of unrelated notes.

(1) I love the "nerdiness" of not realizing that his (caveat) doesn't fix what
he was trying to fix.

 _I’ve never met anyone who knows how to have as much fun with condoms (in
public, anyway)_

(2) Reading gates notes these last few years, I really like Bill, or at least
the literary Bill. There's an honesty in the way he writes that's just
likable. A lot of Warren buffet in his style.

~~~
fipple
Bill Gates is a great guy if you are not standing between him and one of his
goals.

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phkahler
That's all awesome! Now can we get some funding for trials of RISUG? Mr Gates?
or at least thoughts on that.

~~~
MiddleEndian
Vasalgel, a similar technology, is under development in the United States.
Entirely unrelated to Gates to my knowledge.

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b1gnasty
What's with the comment section. Has anyone else noticed more and more word-
salad-AI-bots in comment sections? To what end are ppl building and deploying
these things?

"Nice someone replied, we can make the debate hot and up the discussion. I
saw, maybe, with defined purpose, to motivate me to participate, people
kidding with de Funny Balloons the Condom, so, if I could elaborate a
campaingn, (Please don't get me in touch with politicians, prefer tech
tycoons, movies tycoons....). Anyways, returning, I would elaborate a
campaingn with a "kids kit" with real fun balloons, trying to avoid, the
people use the Condom to fun. If people use the Condom to fun, the real
utility get lost. Resume: LOL; Campaing, explaining about don't use Condom to
other purposes. If can the involved combine the 2 pratices? The Condom,
besides the female, so usefull, indispensable in fact but, I guess, with any
Medical or public health formation, injectable, more effective and some, 3
months of safety. Doing the math maybe a little expensive for governments, 3
to 3 months, the women getting a injection, vacine. Maybe doing the math, more
efective to try to resolve the populational growth without control. We have to
remember the following. Abbandoned people, in anyway tend to search for bad
things. Crimes, drugs, go out home, etc. I see some times, rich people
abbandoned, so, maybe, worth to think what is more expensive for the system. A
correct, effective born control or the troubles caused with the excess of sons
or not structured families. Many questions need to be checked. Religion,
Value, if worth, ages, fertility, anyways, it's a multi disciplin debate.
Health workers, politicians, activists, companies, government, technology, my
old area, is the less useful and THERE ARE A LOT OF SOLUTIONS READY."

~~~
tlb
To me, that reads like stream-of-consciousness comment by a non-native
speaker, not a bot. It's civil, so it would fall in the top half of YouTube
comments, but it doesn't make a substantive point so it would get flagged on
HN.

A large number of people can't write a comment with a clear thesis and
supporting arguments. Most college grads can, but most of the world hasn't
gone to college.

There is lots of crap in the comments section of blogs of famous people,
because lots of people want to think "I spent the morning schooling Bill
Gates!" A wiser person might prefer to be schooled _by_ Bill Gates.

~~~
PhasmaFelis
It reads like someone may also be posting in snippets from Google Translate
when they didn't know the proper English phrase, or at least abusing a
dictionary/thesaurus.

