HUNDREDS of street prostitutes in Scotland are infected with the potentially fatal hepatitis C virus, and experts believe up to 200 of them face a premature death within a few years.
The women have pleaded for the authorities to take notice and warned that the virus, which is 10 times more infectious than HIV, will spread beyond their community and affect the families of their married clients.
However, specialists caution that, while Hepatitis C is easily transmissible and will wreak havoc among prostitutes and addicts, its main route is through syringes.
Hepatitis C is blood-borne and mainly affects intravenous drug users, which most Glasgow street prostitutes are. In Edinburgh, there are fewer addicts but this is changing as Glasgow women increasingly visit the capital for trade.
In Glasgow, 90% of the city's 1000 street prostitutes are injecting drug addicts. Of those, 85% have Hepatitis C. Up to a quarter of those, around 180, face death from cirrhosis or cancer of the liver.
Dr David Goldberg, deputy director of the Scottish Centre for Infection and Environmental Health, said Hepatitis C was a ''big, big problem''.
The SCIEH is compiling a register of thousands of Hepatitis C cases in Scotland. Many thousands more will be unaware they have the virus.
The majority will have injected drugs. Some will have acquired the infection through blood transfusion, a small number sexually, and others through tattoos and body-piercing. A quarter of those exposed to the virus experience no problems.
Scot-Pep co-ordinator Ruth Morgan Thomas said a prostitute-linked Hepatitis C epidemic could put even HIV in the shade. ''It is slightly lower in Edinburgh, but the Glasgow women are coming through to Edinburgh in droves.''
Ms Morgan Thomas said there was evidence hepatitis C could be sexually transmitted, and criticised Lothian Health over its lack of funding for condoms.
Dr Hester Ward, the AIDS co-ordinator for Lothian Health, said gay men remained the priority in the #90,000 condom budget. ''We have a fixed amount of money.''
q The Government will today dump the problem of prostitution in Glasgow on to the city council, writes James Freeman, Home Affairs Correspondent.
A ground-breaking report on the imprisonment of women in Scotland, which will be unveiled today by Scottish Office Home Affairs Minister Henry McLeish, contains a ticking time-bomb on prostitution.
Prepared by Clive Fairweather, the chief inspector of prisons in Scotland, and Angus Skinner, the chief inspector of social work in Scotland, it draws attention to the enormous imbalance between women from Glasgow jailed for soliciting or non-payment of prostitution fines, believed to be around 700 annually, compared to just six from Edinburgh.
The central thrust of the Government's report is that far fewer women should be jailed in Scotland, because the vast majority who are sent to Cornton Vale are not a serious menace to the community, merely a nuisance.
Taking the Glasgow prostitutes out of the Cornton Vale equation would go a long way to bringing numbers down to proportions where the staff could make a therapeutic impact on those remaining prisoners.
Out of the shadows Page 12
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article