Abstract

A cross sectional study was carried out among the 100 floating drug addicted people and 50 commercial sex workers in Dhaka city, Bangladesh. About 26% of sex workers and 36% of drug addicted were aged 20 years. Only thirty six percent of the sex workers and 38% of the drug addicted were married. Among the sex workers, 50% were illiterate whereas 42.9% of the drugs addicted were primary educated. About 78% of the sex workers and 86% of the drugs addicted had monthly income ranges from TK 5,001 to TK 10,000 (1 US$ = 80.00 TK). Among the drug addicts, 94% of the sex workers and 85% of drug addicted had knowledge on human immunodeficiency virus/acquired immune deficiency syndrome (HIV/AIDS) and more than ninety percent (94%) of the sex workers and 78% of the drug addicts had knowledge on route of transmission of HIV/AIDS. For example, they could state that HIV/AIDS can be spread through needle sharing behavior, shaving blade and unprotected sex with HIV positive partners. Majority of respondents were found to have multiple sex partners, and among them only 26% of sex workers and 21.7% of drug addicts were found to use condom regularly. The prevalence of malnutrition among sex workers and drug addicts were 52 and 62%, respectively, and mean body mass index (BMI) of both was 18.54. They (57%) were suffering from various degrees of malnutrition.

Key words: Awareness, commercial sex workers, drug addiction, human immunodeficiency virus/acquired immune deficiency syndrome (HIV/AIDS), nutritional status.