Sex workers struggling with new risks during COVID-19 pandemic

Covid-19 presents a new problem for sex workers. In-person sex work is intimate by its very nature, and workers are at heightened risk of contracting the virus if they keep working. But without work, as strip clubs close and clients dwindle, sex workers struggle to survive.

Lucy Platt, a professor of public health epidemiology at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine explains that sex workers are as much of a transmission risk as hair dressers, bus drivers, or dentists. Yet, while those workers have been issued clear guidelines about how to interact with clients, and some have been required to shut down their businesses altogether, sex workers exist in a grey area where they are neither acknowledged nor supported. Out of desperation, some of them have kept working throughout the pandemic.

In April, The Guardian reported that on one adult website, 800 sex workers across the UK were “available to book”. Last week, the BBC revealed that sex workers in England were travelling from one city to another in order to meet with clients.

The impact is happening now and will get worse as COVID-19 increases in Australia.This fundraiser, will provide emergency relief for sex workers in Australia who do not meet eligibility criteria for government or other financial support or unable to meet government requirements.

And while many of the women are taking extra precautions – asking each client to shower when they arrive, asking questions about recent travel activity – it’s the girlfriend experience or GFE, that clients often come for.

Helping street level sex workers is also a top priority. People who are precariously housed or homeless might have survival needs that eclipse concerns of contracting COVID-19.

“Our society has never done a good job of protecting sex workers or providing for their needs. That’s something they were already facing, it’s just being compounded by COVID-19.”