Price madness spills to sex

By Andile Tshuma

Casual sex has become a luxury only for those with deep pockets as consumables of the adult game have skyrocketed at city pharmacies.

Word on the street is that sex workers in the city have increased their rates. However, there is not much panic ‘buying’ as compared to other commodities that have since gone up.

Hookers said they increased the price of their services following suit as everything else had gone up.
It seems it is not only those that need the service of sex workers that are set to suffer.

“The economy screws us all,” said one disappointed buyer after he found a pack of Carex condoms that usually cost $4 now going for $15 at a local supermarket.

Emergency contraceptives and pregnancy test kit prices have also skyrocketed, with some pharmacies having just removed them from the shelves.

“Just last week, morning after pills cost $5 and I got to the same pharmacy and they tell me that they are $25. It is total madness. We would rather not have sex,” said a Bulawayo woman who refused to be named.

“Now is the time when we should party and drink responsibly because we cannot afford to be getting emergency contraceptives from pharmacies as they are now just unacceptable,” she added.

With sex having become beyond the reach for many, one wonders what the situation requires as many in society find it difficult to resist the call of nature.

A local pharmacist who declined to be named said her pharmacy was only accepting forex and had since displayed prices in rand and US dollars.

She claimed that they changed the prices after they realised that there was a lot of ‘panic buying ‘ of the commodities following the closure of some city pharmacies.

The B-Metro news crew conducted a snap survey around the city and established that most pharmacies had closed shop, purporting to be carrying out stocktaking. However, a number of supermarkets and clothing outlets had also closed for ‘stock take’.

A patron at a local nightspot who identified himself as Tenson Ndoro said casual sex was now beyond his league and he was seriously considering marrying his girlfriend.

“I enjoy no strings attached relationships but I do have a steady girlfriend. Now that the price of safe and responsible intercourse has become so high, the best option is to marry because at the end of the day, the truth is that I can’t live without sex,” said Ndoro.

He said sex workers were now charging an average of $40 per session, something they had been charging between $5 and $10. B-Metro