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Why Women First?
The number of people involved in prostitution is unknown. Estimates vary between 35,000 – over 100,000, with the majority being women.
What is well known, is the high levels of violence perpetrated against women. Women in prostitution are 18 times more likely to be murdered than the general female population.
Beyond the inherent violence of prostitution, three-quarters of women in the sex trade have reported being subjected to violence from men who buy sex.
Too often, services that are supporting women, adopt a “harm reduction” approach. This amounts to crisis management—distributing condoms or safety alarms while women remain trapped in systems of exploitation. This is not enough.
We need to go beyond this and offer real exit pathways: properly funded, specialist women’s services, where support is holistic, trauma-informed, and open-ended.
We also need to challenge the narrative that prostitution is a “choice.”
From our work with survivors, it’s clear that most women were there because of poverty, abuse, addiction, coercion, or a lack of safer options. It was not choice; it was a lack of choice and a matter of survival.