Any law regulating sex work must give a prominent role to sex workers in its drafting and implementation, and must be focused on respecting and protecting both our human and labour rights.
The core objective of such regulation must be to recognize sex work as work in order to regulate this activity and stop the criminalization of workers and the violations of our human rights.
Women sex workers (WSWs) want to affirm our right to work, to decide how to do it and to have the minimum conditions guaranteed to do it. For this, we need laws regulating our activity to be passed immediately and without delay.
As workers, we are entitled to the same guarantees enjoyed by those engaged in any other work and their absence leads to our suffering abuse, violence, increasing precariousness of working conditions and discrimination that are not consistent with the commitments adopted by States in the Region to defend and guarantee the human rights of their entire population.
Instituting a framework of guarantees for women engaged in this trade will be reflected in an improvement of our quality of life, will help to put an end to the stigma, discrimination, harassment and marginalization we suffer, and will contribute to our societies being more inclusive and fair.
For these reasons we demand a specific legal framework and a law clearly defining what sex work is, who fits in the category of woman sex worker, which rights are to be enjoyed by those engaged in this activity, how the State will guarantee that the law is applied and how we will be involved in the policies affecting us.
We need a law recognizing us as workers so we can access housing credit, proper retirement and good quality healthcare without restrictions.
We need a law to defend us from prejudice, exclusion, abuse, stigma and the ongoing violations of our rights.
