Sex work has recently been the subject of considerable public debate in South Africa. It has always aroused a wide range of emotions from the communities in which it exists. In fact, debates on sex work have generated various opinions that have ended in polarizing it. While some people are morally outraged by its presence, others are merely curious about it. Some view it as a threat, while others regard it as a necessary evil of major concern to researchers, nevertheless is how the South African legal system should respond to sex work and related problems such as substance abuse (linked with drug trading and trafficking) and unsafe sex patterns (linked with Sexually Transmitted Infections (STIs) including the Human Immune Deficiency Virus (HIV), which emanate from sex work. Approaches used by other countries towards sex work range from criminalisation, decriminalisation, regulation/legalisation, deregulation/ abolition, or a combination of the above. Longterm efforts are made towards eradicating sex work along with tolerating it, and keeping it away from the public view (Davis & Shaffer, 1994:2; South African Law Commission, 2002:1; and Leggett, 1998:22).