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Coronavirus is changing the world in unprecedented ways. Subscribe here for a daily briefing on how this global crisis is affecting cities, technology, approaches to climate change, and the lives of vulnerable people. DHAKA, June 26 Thomson Reuters Foundation - Thousands of sex workers in Bangladesh are going hungry and many face abuse because they are unable to pay their brokers due to the coronavirus pandemic, charities working with them have warned.
Bangladesh is home to about , sex workers and charities estimate that seven out of 10 are struggling to survive, three months after the country shut down to stop the spread of the virus. Although sex work is legal in Bangladesh, the vast majority operate outside registered brothels, on the streets or in private residences, according to the United Nations, meaning they have little protection from abusers.
KSM Tarique, deputy chief executive of the charity Lighthouse, which helps sex workers access healthcare and education for their children, said most were now having to skip meals and complaints of violence or harassment had surged. But in certain weeks in May we got more than complaints from workers," he said. Rina Akter, a former sex worker who now campaigns for their rights, said at least 35 out of about women she surveyed in Dhaka reported being beaten, either by a pimps or a stranger.
Bangladesh has now lifted most of the restrictions put in place to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, but campaigners said sex work had not recovered. Customers are scared because of the virus and 70 percent of the country's sex workers are struggling to survive right now," said Aliya Akhter Lily, general secretary of the Bangladesh Sex Workers Network. It gave food handouts to registered brothels during the lockdown and on Wednesday it distributed 10 kilos 22 lb of rice to each of the 1, sex workers at the Daulatdia brothel in Dhaka, one of the largest in the world.
