We're No. 1! Shanghai kicks ass in condom use

The People's Daily reports that nearly one-fifth of Shanghai residents use condoms, which puts us atop the country's prophylactic leaderboard. And Shanghaiist likes it on top!

Actually, that's not a difficult position to attain in China. Shanghai tops the list with only 18.31 percent of the population using condoms. In 1995, Shanghai's figure was 9.11 percent. More disturbing, however, is this: Only 5.3 percent of Chinese nationwide are using condoms ... now ... in 2005. That figure, coupled with the fact that many Chinese just don't know much about sex, explains why we have a major AIDS crisis on our hands here. (Might explain, too, why we have 1.3 billion people in this country.)

In Shanghai, at least, access to condoms is not a problem:

The city is now home to more than 17,000 locations offering free condoms, of which 1,185 are open round the clock. It also has 571 automatic condom dispensers.

More than 40 million free condoms were handed out last year in the city of more than 17 million people.

The Shanghai Municipal Population and Family Planning Commission said that since June it has installed a further 330 free condom dispensers in government and commercial office buildings and communities.

It's just getting those Chinese condoms to fit that's the problem.

In other condom news, female condoms are being distributed to sex workers in Southwest China and India is contemplating introducing "vibratory condoms" to its market in an effort to get its population protecting itself (statistics in India are just as bad as China). But who is India turning to for help with its vibrating jimmy hats? You guessed it -- China: "Experts in the government are also planning to hold deliberations with family planning officials in China, an expert in vibrator technology, on vibratory condoms, they said."

Photo by Reuters.