Boston Sex Workers and Allies Collective

For healthcare providers:

• Sex Worker Health: Continuing Education for Healthcare Providers:
  • Module 1
  • Module 2
  • Module 3
• Working with Sex Workers: A Guide for Health Professionals
• COIN Clinic at Callen-Lorde

Learn about decriminalization:

• The UN released this report on March 2024.
• Rhode Island formed a committee to study whether to decriminalize sex work in the state, and recently issued their final report recommending full decriminalization here. (see p. 5-8)
• ACLU policy brief on full decriminalization
• Human Rights Watch statement on full decriminalization
• World Health Organization report recommending full decriminalization
• UNAIDS fact sheet on HIV and sex work
• Open Society Foundation brief on decriminalization 
• Here is a helpful report from Data for Progress, including national polling on decrim.
• Freedom Network’s statement on decriminalization and field report
• Global Alliance on Trafficking in Women’s statement on decriminalization

The Nordic model harms sex workers:

• Amnesty International found that implementation of the Nordic Model in Norway has led to human rights abuses against sex workers.
• A meta-analysis of 52 studies found any form of criminalization of the sex industry, including criminalizing clients, harms sex workers.
• Sweden’s prostitution law did not decrease the number of people selling sex and led to increased dangers for sex workers.
• The Nordic Model has punitive impacts on migrant sex workers.
• This study from Canada found that end-demand laws may exacerbate harm.
• Other reports from sex workers under “end demand” policies:
  • Ireland: Sex Workers Alliance Ireland, “I Feel Targeted And I Can’t Feel Safe: Peer Research of Sex Workers and the Law,” 2020. Link
  • Sweden: Fückforbundet, “Twenty Years of Failing Sex Workers: A Community Report on the Impact of the 1999 Swedish Sex Purchase Act,” September 2019. Link
  • France: Médecins du Monde et al., “What do sex workers think about the French Prostitution Act? A Study on the Impact of the Law from 13 April 2016 Against the ‘Prostitution System’ in France,” 2018. Link

More on the Nordic model:

• Attacking Demand, Escalating Violence: The Impact of Twenty Years of End Demand Implementation on People who Trade Sex summarizes the impact from five different countries
• A policy brief on “End Demand” from the Global Network of Sex Work Projects is available here.
• Here is a recent paper from Chicago studying Nordic Model-style policing.