Calcutta, Nov. 26 :    Calcutta, Nov. 26:  A large number of Calcuttans, like their counterparts in other cities in the country, are suffering from various types of sexual dysfunctions, national and international sexologists said on Sunday. But what is most disturbing is that, unlike Mumbai, Chennai or New Delhi, Calcutta has an acute shortage of trained sexologists to address these problems. Calcutta is the only metro without a department of sexual medicine, either at government-level hospitals or those in the private sector, observed experts at the end of Calcon-2000, a three-day national conference, the first of its kind in the east. 'People in Mumbai have access to facilities and doctors at the KEM Hospital and other established centres, while in Chennai, Apollo Hospital has a specialised department. Even the All-India Institute of Medical Sciences in New Delhi has started a separate department for sexual medicine,' pointed out Dr Govind K. Gupta, one of the few trained consultants on sex medicine in Calcutta. 'As a result, a large number of people with problems are forced to go to quacks on Grant Street and other such places,' said Gupta, organising secretary of the conference. 'Instead of getting a solution, the patients face harassment, and even a worsening of the problem.' The affluent go off to other cities for treatment, as a sexual problem can lead to 'frustration, marital disharmony and physical complications.' Admitting that many people in the city were visiting 'footpath doctors' for treatment of 'private diseases', Dr B.R. Sarkar, Bengal state branch president of the Indian Medical Association, said various sexual disorders were being treated in Calcutta by gynaecologists, psychiatrists, urologists and skin specialists. 'But professional counselling is just not there,' he said. Sarkar's inaugural address at the conference, attended by about 115 delegates from India and abroad, revealed that a 'staggering Rs 40,000 crore is spent in India every year by clients on sex workers, 30 per cent of whom are under-age'. 'At an international narcotics conference in Japan in January, it was disclosed that the use of sex-stimulants, with harmful side-effects, was on the rise among Indians,' Sarkar added. These facts showed that problems were not being tackled in the proper manner. 'What we lack most is proper sex education. There are several cases of both boys and girls becoming confused over natural sexual phenomena like menstruation and reproductive systems.' The conference discussed issues like love and relationships, erectile dysfunction, homosexuality, infertility, the latest sexually-transmitted diseases, sexual addiction, andropause (hormone fall in men after 40), female sex problems and most of all, lack of education leading to taboos on talking about sex and sexuality. 'Sexology is a scientific study of human society, encompassing behaviour, psychology, culture, diseases, and problems,' said Dr M.C. Watsa from Mumbai. The presentation by Dr Saroj Gumaste of Mumbai on why women say 'no' and on sex practices and beliefs among women in village societies was adjudged the 'best paper' at Calcon.