The Ghana Aids Commission says a large number of young women in Ghana are taking to sex work in order to raise income and other benefits.

The commission says the new modus operandi of such women has been the use of internet based applications to connect to men who are interested.

Speaking to the JoyNews health desk, the Director General of the Commission, Dr Steve Kyeremeh Atuahene stated that “The first time we did sex worker population size estimate that was 2011, the population then was around 50,000. The last time we did it, it was almost 70, 000, that is 4 years after.

“Now many of them (sex workers) don’t solicit on the streets. They do it on the internet. And so you have hookup where (a) lady or young men will go to a client at an agreed place. We have some who also operate from a home-based kind of setting. And so, it’s going on.”

He bemoaned that this surge is tampering with the efforts of the commission to fight the spread of HIV in the country.

Dr Atuahene further highlighted that although there has been an increase in the number of young women venturing into the sex work trade, most of the ladies do not recognise that what they do qualifies as sex work.

But he explained that when an individual considers their bodies a source of income and accordingly exchanges sex for money, then that practice is considered sex work.

“Sex work is about exchanging sex for money, gifts or any other thing. Here is the case where we have many women seeing their bodies as source of income. And if you use your body as source of income, then it means you’ll have to make the body available to multiple men in order to raise enough income. And that is where the challenge is.”

Although he acknowledged that the cause for this surge in sex trade is attributable to the presently prevalent economic hardships he advised that sex work is not the solution to earning an income.

The revelation made by the Director General of the Ghana Aids Commission follows a 2022 HIV/AIDS situational report released by the commission during the course of the week.

The report indicated that over 100,000 persons in the country are HIV carriers.

It was noted that the HIV carriers were unaware of their status and were spreading the virus.

But the Director General of the Ghana AIDS Commission assured that the commission has mounted an aggressive search for the over 100,000 persons with HIV to bring them under treatment.