SynthesisArchives of women's mental health2026
Mental health burden among survivors of sexual-exploitation trafficking: a global systematic review, meta-analysis, and meta-regression.
Synthesis in Archives of women's mental health, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.
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Authors and funding
3 authors.
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Abstract
purposeSurvivors of trafficking for sexual exploitation endure sustained violence, coercion and isolation, yet the resulting psychiatric burden has not been reliably quantified across global settings. We aimed to estimate the pooled prevalence of mental-health disorders among survivors, to test whether geographical region, exploitation modality or gender explains variation between studies, and to establish how comprehensively the existing literature reports survivors' help-seeking and the structural determinants of their care.
methodsWe searched PubMed/MEDLINE, Web of Science, PsycINFO, Cochrane Library and Scopus for quantitative studies published between January 2000 and December 2025 reporting mental-health outcomes among survivors of trafficking involving sexual exploitation. Prevalence was pooled using random-effects models; heterogeneity was quantified using I
resultsEighteen studies were included. Pooled prevalence was 44.0% for PTSD (95% CI 30.3-58.7; 15 studies), 50.5% for depression (16 studies), 52.3% for anxiety (14 studies) and 19.1% for suicide attempts (4 studies). Heterogeneity was extreme (I
conclusionsAround half of survivors meet symptom criteria for PTSD, depression or anxiety, and one in five has attempted suicide, a burden warranting routine screening and sustained trauma-informed care wherever survivors are identified. Wide between-study variation means these figures should guide service planning rather than be read as precise population estimates.
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