WISH Drop-In Centre Society

At WISH, our mission is to improve the health, safety and well-being of women and gender-diverse people who are involved in Vancouver’s street-based sex trade. Our vision is for every sex worker to have access to opportunities to make free, healthy and positive choices. 

 
Based in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside, WISH is on the unceded, stolen lands of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and səlilwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) First Nations. For almost 40 years, WISH has been a refuge and an essential point of contact for street-based sex workers who have been made vulnerable due to poverty, homelessness, trauma, violence, stigma, and a lack of access to supports and opportunities.  

Street-based sex work is the type of sex work that is the most dangerous and has the least amount of choice. Those who engage in this form of sex work are overwhelmingly doing so just to survive. Eighty percent of WISH participants are homeless. Half are Indigenous. All live in poverty.