Sex clients should prove HIV status

HEALTH Minister Dr Aaron Motsoaledi deserves commendation for advising sex workers to ask clients for proof of being HIV-negative, as, let’s face it, condoms are at best only 98.5% effective as contraception and about 95% safe at protection against HIV!

I would like to point out that unless a reliable and secure HIV testing facility is established, men will obviously lie to get what they are after, but this is just one side of a very dangerous equation.

Prostitutes should also have to provide proof that they are HIV-negative to male clients as, truth be told, they work in one of the greatest HIV-risk environments in the world.

If the costs of establishing safe testing certification facilities are extremely expensive, is the simpler solution not just to ban sex work while such an unavoidable risk exists? These safety costs could make sex work uneconomical if the industry pays for its own upkeep, which it should, right?