Sex workers forced to take harmful drug

A significant number of female sex workers are forced to take Oradexon, a weight gain drug, which is very harmful to their health, speakers told dialogue yesterday.
Female pimps or customers force mostly the teenagers to take the drug so that "they look adult, beautiful, and more attractive", they said.
Titled "Beyond the scene: Steroid drug practice among sex workers and our responses", the discussion was organised by ActionAid at the city's Jatiya Press Club to raise awareness and mount a campaign to ensure rights of sex workers.
Oradexon, a drug of Dexamethasone group, is normally used for the cattle to make them fleshy. But it is used in many brothels that can cause nephritis, high blood pressure, bone decay, tuberculosis, and psychosis to sex workers in the long run.
Quoting a study conducted on 948 sex workers in Doulotdia and Madaripur brothels in 2005, the speakers said the practice is prevalent in the age group of 15 to 35 mainly, and the users gradually get addicted to the drug and cannot withdraw themselves from it.
"It causes nausea, insomnia, runny nose, and muscle pain if someone tries to withdraw from the drug available in all pharmacies nearby the brothels. So it is very difficult to get out of the trap", said Hena Akhter of Sex Workers Network of Bangladesh.
Terming it an extreme form of exploitation, Shaheen Anam, executive director of Manusher Jonno Foundation, said the issue should be placed to the policy makers. "Most of the girls in this profession are battered by poverty or sexual exploitation. We must think of their rehabilitation and reintegration", she said.
Presenting the keynote paper, Lutfun Nahar, manager of ActionAid, recommended that the level of health knowledge among sex workers should be increased through different training sessions involving the pimps, quacks, doctors, and others.
The speakers also said the Directorate General of Drug Administration must strengthen its monitoring to ensure rational use of the drugs.
Rabeya Sultana, head of Justice for Marginalised, ActionAid; Dr Zahid Mohammad Masud, executive director of AITAM Welfare Foundation; and Prof Manash Chowdhury of Jahangirnagar University also spoke at the dialogue.