Sex Work Is Work

Sex-work harm reduction.

Sex work is an extremely dangerous profession. The use of harm-reduction principles can help to safeguard sex workers' lives in the same way that drug users have benefited from drug-use harm reduction. Sex workers are exposed to serious harms: drug use, disease, violence, discrimination, debt, criminalisation, and exploitation (child prostitution, trafficking for sex work, and exploitation of m...

Sex work and HIV/AIDS

■ While sex work is a universal phenomenon, it is also frequently illegal and, therefore, clandestine. This makes it difficult to determine the true extent of the sex work industry, although it is acknowledged to be substantial and has apparently been increasing in recent years. This increase has been attributed to various factors, including changes in political, civil and socioeconomic conditi...

Sex work and HIV/AIDS

Sex work: a comparative study.

Explanations of adult involvement in sex work typically adopt one of two approaches. One perspective highlights a variety of negative experiences in childhood and adolescence, including physical and sexual abuse, family instability, poverty, associations with "pimps" and other exploiters, homelessness, and drug use. An alternative account recognizes that some of these factors may be involved, b...

Sex Work Criminalization Is Barking Up the Wrong Tree

There is a notable shift toward more repression and criminalization in sex work policies, in Europe and elsewhere. So-called neo-abolitionism reduces sex work to trafficking, with increased policing and persecution as a result. Punitive "demand reduction" strategies are progressively more popular. These developments call for a review of what we know about the effects of punishing and repressive...