Brazil has fully vaccinated just slightly over 2% of its 200-million population, with first-line COVID jabs being distributed among prioritised groups of health workers, the elderly, and indigenous people.
Prostitutes in the Brazilian city of Belo Horizonte have gone on a week-long strike, urging the government to give them prioritised COVID shots alongside other “front line” workers, the AFP reports.
On Monday, a group of sex workers from the Association of Prostitutes of Mins Gerais took over a street full of shuttered hotels where they once worked, in pre-pandemic times. Now they have been forced out onto the street to solicit for clients, still legally, but in a much less secure environment, prostitutes reveal.
“We are in the front line, moving the economy and we are at risk,” the association’s president Cida Vieira, who took part in the protest, told AFP. “We need to get vaccinated.”
Sex workers protest at Rua Guaicurus, the main bohemian area of Belo Horizonte, state of Minas Gerais, Brazil on April 5, 2021, asking to be considered a priority group to receive the vaccine agaisnt COVID-19
In December, Brazil’s Health Ministry unveiled a four-stage plan for national vaccination, with health workers, indigenous people, the elderly people and those with prior health conditions being among those group of citizens – approximately 77 million people – poised to get their COVID jabs in the first three waves.
The last vaccination stage would include inoculations to teachers, first responders and security personnel; only then would the wider population, including prostitutes, be entitled to their injections.
Viera believes it’s wrong to disregard Brazilian prostitutes, as they are a vulnerable, yet valuable part of the population.
Sex workers protest at Rua Guaicurus, the main bohemian area of Belo Horizonte, state of Minas Gerais, Brazil on April 5, 2021, asking to be considered a priority group to receive the vaccine agaisnt COVID-19
Her colleagues, who during the protest held placards proclaiming “sex workers are health professionals too”, agreed.
Over 5 million Brazilians have been fully vaccinated against coronavirus so far, as the country is battling the second wave of the pandemic. Brazil expects to vaccine its priority groups in the first part of 2021, but the process may take longer due to vaccine shortages. So far, Brazil has authorised only four vaccines – AstraZeneca, China’s Sinovac Biotech, Pfizer and a single-shot Johnson & Johnson jab.
Sourse: sputniknews.com
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