Resource Center

2020 was a year that everyone will live to remember. The first Covid-19 case was reported in Kenya in March. subsequently, hardships amongst the sex workers community started erupting with closure of bars which have always been their soliciting sites, cessation of movement restricting their inter county movements, Dusk to dawn curfew which disrupted sex workers working hours forcing them to work during the day a trend that made sex workers susceptible to violence, vulnerable to police harassments as well as stigma, discrimination and being ousted in their families. The pandemic made sex workers hopeless and heavily dependent, this made them vulnerable to getting infected with HIV and STIs due to the desperation and ended up selling sex to everyone with no negotiating power. Hunger creeped in and many sex workers starved. Those who were on ART defaulted due to hunger and unavailability of work. Viral loads went high, new HIV infections were recorded, malnutrition creeped in, we sought for help from our partners and we thank UHAI-EASHRI, Frontline AIDS and Global Fund for Women for supporting KIASWA feed 1860 extremely needy sex workers who had lost hope as well as supported KIASWA in distribution of essentials. e also wish to thank Frontline AIDS for supporting us twice in bailing out arrested sex workers as well as sensitize police officers when violence against sex workers was at the peak and sex workers were being arrested every day and harrassed to either bribe with cash or even with sex and this posed a lot of danger to sex worker community