Sex Worker Implementation Tool (SWIT)

Sex Worker Implementation Tool (SWIT)
Source
WHO, UNFPA, UNAIDS, NSWP, The World Bank, UNDP
Download this resource
Year
2013

The Sex Worker Implementation Tool (SWIT) offers practical guidance on effective HIV and STI programming for sex workers. It provides evidence for the necessity of decriminalisation of sex work, the involvement of sex workers in developing policy, and the empowerment and self-determination of sex work communities as a fundamental part of the fight against HIV. This resource is based on the WHO, UNFPA, UNAIDS and NSWP 2012 recommendations on HIV and Sex Work. A 24-page Smart Guide to the SWIT is also available.

The full name of the SWIT is Implementing Comprehensive HIV/STI Programmes with Sex Workers: Practical Approaches from Collaborative Interventions. It was produced in collaboration with sex worker-led organisations by WHO, UNFPA, UNAIDS, NSWP, The World Bank and UNDP. In 2015, NSWP reflected on the development and impact of the SWIT in the SWIT Case Study.

Contents include:

  • Community Empowerment
    • Working with communities of sex workers
    • Fostering sex worker-led outreach
    • Developing sex worker collectives
    • Promoting a human-rights framework
    • Community systems strengthening (strengthening the collective)
    • Shaping policy and creating enabling environments
    • Sustaining the movement
  • Addressing Violence against Sex Workers
    • Contexts of violence
    • Values and principles for addressing violence against sex workers
    • Promising interventions and strategies
    • Building the capacity of sex workers
    • Advocating for reforms
    • Fostering police accountability
    • Promoting the safety and security of sex workers
    • Providing health services to sex workers who experience violence
    • Providing psychosocial, legal and other support services
  • Community-led Services
    • Community-led outreach
    • Safe spaces (drop-in centres)
    • Community-led quality improvement
    • Other community-led approaches to reinforce quality of clinical services
  • Condom and Lubricant Programming
    • Steps in effective condom programming
    • Establishing accessible male and female condom and lubricant
    • Supplies for sex workers
    • Multi-level promotion of male and female condoms and lubricants
    • Community-led condom promotion
    • Destigmatizing condoms in the broader social environment
    • Creating an enabling environment for condom programming
    • Condom programming with male and transgender sex workers
  • Clinical and Support Services
    • Operational principles for clinical and support services
    • Voluntary HIV testing and counselling
    • Antiretroviral therapy
    • Treatment Literacy
    • Tuberculosis and sex workers
    • Additional services for sex workers who inject drugs
    • STI services
    • Addressing the sexual and reproductive health needs of sex workers
    • Mental health
  • Programme Management and Organizational Capacity-building
  • Building the Capacity of Sex Worker Organizations

You can download this 196-page PDF above. This resource is available in English, French, Russian, and Spanish.

Thanks to PJ Starr who supplied the image featured on the cover of this document.