Page 39 - OOHNA Spring-Summer 2017
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n FOCUS



Editor’s note: this FocuS column aims to introduce readers to topics outside occupational health and safety.

Human trafficking: it’S everYWHere



by Sandy Biback



We all stay in hotels, most of us “star” a hotel or convention cen- rob Heitzner, Human trafficking
travel by plane or train and go to tre or sporting arena has. From Enforcement team, toronto Police
conferences, sporting events and one star to five stars, human traf- Service, who said:
fundraisers. Have you ever said to ficking is present. i’ve spent the “Victims of Human trafficking
yourself “that looks strange” and last 30 years planning conferences are people that live on your street,
then let it pass from your mind and events and i know there have live next door, your daughters go
because of what you are in the been times when i thought some- to school with them. Victims are
middle of doing – DON’T! thing was wrong – and i let it pass vulnerable and traffickers attack
as an event planner and educa- because “i was too busy”. that vulnerability. the internet
tor, i’ve spent the last 18 months grants a platform for traffickers
researching this human tragedy. Girls and boys as young as 12 and enormously increases recruit-
Why? Because it is happening in are being trafficked ment numbers”.
canada’s hotels, on our airplanes, Since starting my awareness of Yes, sex tourism thrives in many
countries and yes, many foreign-
in our restaurants, at our sport- human trafficking, i have had
ing events, at our conferences, at many interviews with those trying ers are trafficked in canada. My
trucking stops along main high- to stop this crime against human- research and meetings with oth-
ways. there is no barrier to what ity. in 2016, i spoke with detective ers has proven detective Heitzner













































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