By Trudy Simpson, Staff Reporter
ABOUT ONE million children enter the sex trade each year, says the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF). Among them are boys and girls of every class, colour and creed.
According to a UNICEF publication, "Profiting from Abuse an investigation into the sexual exploitation of children", the situation is fuelled not only by poverty but by ignorance, greed on the part of exploiters, and families and family dysfunction and breakdown.
In the latter, caregivers emotionally, physically or sexually abuse children, constantly fight, divorce, or re-marry, breeding runaways, children with unresolved conflicts of sexual identity among others, who are later exploited.
"When families become homeless also, or are forced to move from place to place, a caregiver's abilities to care for and protect their children are also severely limited," the report said. "(So) sometimes children run away; other times, they are left to fend for themselves."
Weak or inadequate laws and corrupt officials offer them little or no protection and even law-abiding officials are often underpaid, overworked and lack resources, making them vulnerable to bribery or limiting the number of children they can protect.
Among the oldest factors influencing the exploitation are war, natural disasters, political instability and cultural beliefs, especially where child marriage and mistaken beliefs that younger children do not carry HIV flourish.
But there are also new factors: globalisation, HIV/AIDS, which leave many children and youth orphaned and force them use available means to be bread-winners; and also new communications technology, like the Internet, which while it can help to protect children, is also used to exploit them. The Internet, for example, knows no national boundaries and is almost without regulation, UNICEF said.
In addition, efforts to halt the problem are being hampered by mistaken beliefs, among them ones which state that having sex with a virgin or young child will cure HIV/AIDS. "Many exploiters are under the mistaken notion that younger children don't carry HIV. Yet children who are not fully grown are more likely than adults to be injured by penetrative sex, making it easier for the virus to enter their bodies. Children are also unlikely to be able to insist on safe sex practices or to even have information regarding risks of infection or access to condoms," UNICEF said.
Among other myths is that child abuse and commercial sexual exploitation are not widespread problems, though secrecy and intense feelings of shame may prevent children and adults aware of the abuse from seeking help.
In addition, there are mistaken beliefs that children in prostitution choose this profession, that child sexual exploitation is a recent phenomenon largely initiated by sex tourists, and that sex exploiters are all paedophiles (adults attracted to children) and strangers.
The fact is that sexual exploitation has a long history, involving paedophiles, yes, but the majority of sexually abused children who are not involved in commercial sexual activity are abused by someone they know: parents, step-parents, teachers, doctors, relatives, clergy and neighbours, the report said.
