Venezuela’s economic crisis is so bad that women are turning to sex work to live

Two
Venezuelan women talking to the Sky News reporter Alex Crawford
about turning to sex work in Colombia.
Sky News

• Venezuela is suffering from currency inflation, power
  cuts, and food shortages.
• As a result, several Venezuelan women are taking up sex
  work in neighboring Colombia, a Sky News investigation
  found.
• The investigation, broadcast Friday, found that nearly
  all the workers in a brothel in a Colombian city near the
  border were Venezuelans.
• Women who spoke to Sky News said they had no other way
  of feeding their families as Venezuela’s currency is so weak
  and supplies are so short. 

Several Venezuelan women are taking up sex work in neighboring
Colombia because the economic crisis in their country has made it
impossible to make a living,
a new investigation by Sky News found.

Cúcuta, a Colombian city near the border with Venezuela, is
seeing an influx of Venezuelan women who are working in brothels
to get by, the Sky News report says.

These women — and many others — have been forced out of Venezuela
as
the country is in economic ruin, experiencing hyperinflation,

severe power cuts, and food
and medicine shortages.

Sky News found that out of 60 women in a Cúcuta brothel, two were
Colombians, while the rest were Venezuelans. The reporter, Alex
Crawford, said one woman charged as little as $33 per client.

“Anything would be better,” one woman said. “I do this because I
have to do this.”

Another woman told Crawford it was the only way she could get
money to feed her family.

The women have left Venezuela temporarily and have no formal
immigration documents, meaning they can’t legally get employment,
Sky News said.

People
wait in line for food in Venezuela on
Thursday.
Reuters

Venezuela’s economy has been in a tailspin for months, prompting
drastic measures from the government. Venezuelan President
Nicolás Maduro lopped five zeros from the bolívar on Monday in an
attempt to halt rampant hyperinflation that has
pushed a packet of rice to 2.5 million bolívars.