The risk of contracting HIV is 14 times higher for female sex workers in low- and middle-income countries (LMIC) than for women in the general population, according to a study published Online First in The Lancet Infectious Diseases.
Three decades have passed since the global HIV epidemic started, yet the knowledge about HIV amongst sex workers is still limited, despite these women’s increased risk of infection because of higher exposure to biological, behavioral and structural risk factors.
Dr. Stefan Baral, from the Center for Public Health and Human Rights at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore, MD, USA, and his team decided to perform a meta-analysis of 102 studies that included nearly 100,000 female sex workers in 50 countries.