Many Ontario teenagers are receiving condoms from their schools amid fierce controversy.

The safe sex issue has triggered the same friction as in Bermuda.

Some Government schools in Ontario hand out condoms at special health clinics.

Others have put condom machines in washrooms.

But many Catholic schools in the Canadian province have refused to follow suit.

Meanwhile, Bermuda's Health Minister the Hon. Quinton Edness revealed yesterday he would be seeking safe sex recommendations from schools.

"I am writing to ask them to consider how they can provide further protection for students,'' he said. "This could be by encouraging abstinence or condom distribution.'' Mr. Edness welcomed the same lively debate on the issue as in Canada.

And he wanted Parent Teachers Associations to make their own positions clear.

Mr. Edness said he was disturbed by the number of Bermudian youngsters risking AIDS through unprotected sex.

In Ontario Government officials have dubbed the AIDS statistics "frightening''.

By March this year 659 Ontario youngsters, aged 15-19, had been diagnosed as suffering from AIDS since records began about five years ago.

Of these 615 were male, and 44 female.

In Toronto, 1992 figures reveal 65 people, aged 15-19, with HIV.

Thirty males contracted the AIDS virus through homosexual contact, five because of drug use, and 22 contaminated blood.

Of the women, four caught it through drugs, one tainted blood, and another through sex with a high risk partner.

It is not known how the two others contracted the illness.

Yesterday Ontario Education Ministry spokesman Mr. Michel Rodrigue said the controversy over condom use at high schools continued to rage.

It was up to each school board -- made up of trustees elected every two years -- to decide what course to take.

Such boards were "autonomous'' and not dictated to by Parliament, Mr.

Rodrigue explained.

"Some have made the decision to have health clinics where the distribution of condoms is one of the services. Students can also be offered consultation on a number of health issues.'' Mr. Rodrigue added some schools also placed condom machines in washrooms.

Both methods of condom distribution had started about five or six years ago, Mr. Rodrigue said.

He was unable to say how many schools were now supplying the contraceptive.

Mr. Rodrigue, however, said 35 percent of schools in Ontario were Catholic -- and these refused to introduce condoms.

"There is very much a lively debate here over distribution of condoms in schools.

"The proponents say it does decrease the percentage of pregnancies in teenage women.'' Mr. Rodrigue described as "frightening'' some of the AIDS statistics.

He added Ontario's Government had a limited role to play on the safe sex issue.

The Health Ministry had compiled statistics and set up programmes to encourage sexually active teenagers to use condoms.

It was, however, for schools -- funded by Parliament and local taxation -- to take their own course.