HIV prevention while the bulldozers roll: Exploring the effect of the demolition of Goa’s red-light area

An article by Shahmanesh M, Wayal S, Andrew G, Patel V, Cowan FM and Hart G in Social Science and Medicine 2009; 69:604-12.

This article provides a detailed examination of the demolition of Baina, one of India’s large red-light areas, in 2004, and one of the first accounts of the effect of dismantling the red-light area on the organisation of sexwork and sex-workers’ sexual risk. The results suggest that the concentrated and homogeneous brothel-based sex-work environment rapidly evolved into heterogeneous, clandestine and dispersed modes of operation. The social context of sex-work that emerged from the dust of the demolition was higher risk and less conducive to HIV prevention. The findings suggest that an abolitionist approach to sex-work and legislation or policy that either criminalises this large group of women, or renders them as invisible victims, will increase the stigma and exclusion they experience. (summary adapted from authors' abstract)