Vulnerability and involvement in drug use and ... - Sex Work Europe

Homeless/insecure housing at time of first sex work
Tw e n t y - t h ree (22%) participants re p o rted being homeless or living in temporary accommodation
when they first sold sex. Previous Home Office funded studies collected data on sex workers’
accommodation at the time of interv i e w. Fifty-one per cent were either in temporary
accommodation, homeless, in a hostel or serving a prison sentence at the time of interv i e w. Tw o -
t h i rds (n=67) of the women interviewed for the study in King’s Cross were homeless at the time of
i n t e rv i e w. Of the seventeen participants who were aged 24 or under, 14 (82%) were either
homeless or in temporary accommodation. All three of the under 18s in this study re p o rted being
homeless at the time of interview and all three were in the care of social services at the time.
Relationships between vulnerability factors
This section investigates relationships between vulnerability factors. It focuses on the
vulnerability factors directly related to this study’s re s e a rch questions but includes other
vulnerability factors of interest to the research programme on youth vulnerability.
Drug use and problem drug use
In comparison with findings on drug use prevalence from the BCS, those from this study’s
sample of drug-using sex workers suggest higher drug use prevalence in this population. In
particular, the greater use of crack cocaine, heroin and non-prescribed methadone predict
high levels of problematic drug use among these participants. This was confirmed in that
one hundred participants (81%) reported that they had experience of problem drug use. Of
these, just under 60 per cent (n=59; 59%) reported having a drug problem currently, while
just over 40 per cent (n=41; 41%) reported having a drug problem in the past.
Early ‘hard drug’ use by problematic drug use
The mean age at which participants re p o rted first using ‘hard drugs’ was one and a half
years lower among those who re p o rted ever experiencing a drug problem than among those
who re p o rted never experiencing a drug problem (16.2 and 17.7 years, re s p e c t i v e l y ) .
Age of first ‘hard drug’ use by age of first sex work
There was a positive relationship between age of first ‘hard drug’ use and age of first sex
work, such that early onset of drug use was strongly related to early onset of sex work. This
association was statistically significant.
Vulnerabilities
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