A series of photographs taken in the slums of Lagos shows the faces of sex workers living in squalid conditions.
And the images have a tragic undercurrent, with tens of thousands of
people in the sex trade diagnosed with HIV each year, and millions dying
from AIDS across Nigeria.
A study in 2013 found that nearly a quarter of Nigerian sex workers have HIV
A survey conducted last year has also highlighted that attitudes towards
condom use is helping the spread of the condition, and research
suggests that nearly a quarter of Nigerian sex workers have HIV.
The pictures were taken in a Lagos slum, where girls as young as 14 entertain up to five clients per day
The pictures were taken by photographer Ton Koene in Lagos, Nigeria's largest city
A woman stands next to an advert encouraging condom use, in a country
where researchers found more needs to be done to change attitudes toward
safe sex
The pictures were taken by photographer Ton Koeneon in a Lagos slum named Badia.
There are currently an estimated 1.2million people in Lagos, Nigeria's largest city, living with HIV.
He said his driver had quipped: 'If you arrive by car, you can smell the HIV virus outside.'
A man speaks to a woman in the Badia slum in Lagos, where hundreds of women work in the sex trade in order to survive
In Badia, sex workers as young as 14, trying to earn money to survive, entertain around five clients a day.
Last year a study by the Iranian Journal of Public Health noted that the
country has a 4.1 per cent HIV/AIDS prevalence rate in adults.
Thanks to investment and education, the study found, the rate had fallen
from five per cent in the early 2000s, but it said there is still some
way to go.
Three years ago, research by the Journal of the International AIDS
Society found the prevalence among sex workers in Nigeria was 24.3 per
cent.
Last year's study said women often found they could not ask their
husbands or boyfriends to wear condoms, and were not expected to carry
them.
One respondent, a 28-year-old marketing executive, said: 'The problem is
that you cannot even suggest the use of that thing to your boyfriend.
A sex worker smokes a cigarette in the series of photographs taken by photographer Ton Koene
'It’s like if you say it you are accusing him of sleeping around or that
you are not sure of yourself. No matter which one, it can end the
relationship and give you a bad name.'
It stated: 'To confirm this cultural barrier to access to prevention
tools, only one female respondent... has ever gone to buy a condom for
her boyfriend, while all the other female respondents were of the view
that they would not like their parents and spouses to see them with
condoms.'
A 42-year-old father of three told researchers in the study: 'Any woman,
including my wife who tells her husband about it or gets it for them to
use needs to be questioned. In short, she should be seriously
sanctioned.'
