Focus

Activists face uphill battle against AIDS

By Duan Yan and Shan Juan (China Daily)
Updated: 2010-12-01 08:05

Top: Many "hair salons" were shut down during the recent campaigns against the sex industry in Yuxi. Above: Two young women relax on a sofa as they wait for customers at a "massage parlor" in Yuxi on Nov 24.

In the clubs

Nightclubs are hotspots for sex workers, although most refused to even admit they employed them when first approached by the CDC, said Li Jinlin.

Meidong works as a so-called "bar girl" at Yedu, a glitzy new club in Hongta where young women dressed in yellow miniskirts greet customers at the door. She is a key contact for the district CDC and helps to organize more than 60 women for awareness meetings and free health checks.

"We select those sex workers who are more eloquent and educated to help (us to reach) more women," explained Li Jinlin, who said several leading members of this grassroots group left the city during recent crackdowns.

At Yedu, Meidong introduced two of her colleagues to China Daily.

"I'm a freelancer," said Liu Ping, a 25-year-old college graduate from Yibin in Sichuan province. "I make 200 yuan ($30) for every client and give 20 yuan to the club. It's reasonable. Some nightclubs charge 50 yuan."

When she was asked if she would have sex with a client without a condom, she replied: "Of course not. That would be reckless."

Next to her, Zhang Lifang, 24, said she only offers to have a drink with her clients, not sex. The shy girl from the nearby city of Qujing added: "I know drinking alcohol from the same glass as a client is unsanitary but I won't get infected with HIV doing it."

Workers from the CDC have become familiar faces in clubs and "hair salons". The first step is speaking in a language sex workers are comfortable with. Simply put, "we can't be shy about it", said Hongta deputy director Ma Yi.

However, the recent crackdowns have made prostitutes and their pimps less willing to talk.

Compared with the stark setting of Yedu, "hair salons" are often more shabby in appearance and more secretive. CDC workers usually have to go undercover before they can talk to the women about safe sex and HIV prevention.

At a "massage parlor" China Daily reporters visited with Ma, a 19-year-old woman offered Ma the chance to "date" her for 100 yuan. He immediately told the storeowner, Li Aihong, that he was from the CDC.

"No wonder you look so familiar. I've seen you at the meetings," replied Li Aihong, lifting her head only briefly from her cross-stitching. "These two girls just came to work for me last week."

Although unwilling to give her name, the 19-year-old agreed to talk about HIV, explaining that all she knows "is that people can die from it".

When asked about how the virus is transmitted, she pointed at China Daily's male photographer as he was taking pictures and said: "I could get it from him." She then laughed and pulled a blanket over her head, too embarrassed to continue.