Morgan Lowrie, The Canadian Press Published Saturday, July 23, 2022 6:10 PM EDT Last Updated Saturday, July 23, 2022 6:10 PM EDT
MONTREAL — Tourists were among those lining up to receive monkeypox vaccines in Montreal on Saturday as the World Health Organization declared the virus a global health emergency.
Brian Maci was one of several New Yorkers waiting to receive the vaccine at an open-air clinic in the city’s gay village.
Maci, who was already on vacation in Montreal, said she was asked to get vaccinated in Canada after unsuccessfully trying to book an appointment at home.
“It’s like concert tickets,” he said of the process in New York.
She said she went online just as appointments opened at 6pm, only to have to constantly refresh a stalled app and eventually be told no appointments were available.
Later, at a drag show, he heard an announcement that vaccines were available in Montreal, even for tourists.
“They mentioned that this was here and it’s the best thing ever because the community is reaching out, and I can get it without having to deal with the US,” he said.
Another vacationing couple from New York told a similar story about trying to book an appointment for a shot at home.
“I was kicked out of the system maybe five or six times and eventually there were no more appointments and no telling when more appointments were going to be released,” said Brad, a 36-year-old man who did not want to give his last name. .
“We were able to come here and get a visit shot and it’s amazing, an amazing service,” he said.
Montreal is offering vaccination against the disease to all men who have sex with men, as well as people who have been exposed to monkeypox.
On Saturday, a dozen health workers sat under pink and blue tents on Rue Ste-Catherine, providing information to people who stopped to ask about the vaccine.
The men were asked for their health card or, in the case of tourists, an ID, and sat under tents or stood on a nearby wall waiting their turn.
McGill University infectious disease specialist Michael Libman said opening up the vaccine to tourists “makes perfect sense” and is the right thing to do to prevent the disease from spreading.
“The big problem is not local spread, but people moving the disease from one place to another,” he said in a telephone interview.
The World Health Organization announced on Saturday that monkeypox is now classified as a global emergency, noting that it has spread to more than 70 countries.
A global emergency is the organization’s highest level of alert, but the designation does not necessarily mean that a disease is particularly communicable or lethal. Similar statements were made in 2016 for the Zika virus in Latin America and the ongoing effort to eradicate polio, in addition to the COVID-19 pandemic and the 2014 Ebola outbreak in West Africa.
WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus made the decision to call monkeypox a global emergency despite a lack of consensus among experts on the United Nations health agency’s emergency committee, saying it acted as “a tie breaker”. It was the first time that a head of the United Nations health agency had made such a decision unilaterally without the recommendation of an expert.
“We have an outbreak that has spread around the world rapidly through new modes of transmission, about which we understand too little,” he said. “I know this has not been an easy or straightforward process and that there are differing opinions.”
Although monkeypox has been established in parts of central and western Africa for decades, it was not known to trigger large outbreaks beyond the continent or spread widely among people until May, when authorities they detected dozens of epidemics in Europe, North America and elsewhere.
According to the Public Health Agency of Canada, there were 681 confirmed cases of smallpox in five Canadian provinces on Saturday, including 331 in Quebec. The number of cases has doubled since July 1, the agency said, noting that the first diagnosis involving a woman and the first infections in the province of Saskatchewan were also recorded during the same period of time
“Since the beginning of the outbreak, the highest priority of the Government of Canada has been to protect the health of all Canadians,” read a statement issued after the WHO statement. “The government recognizes WHO’s determination and will continue its work with the provinces and territories as it has done since the start of the smallpox outbreak.” ***
The Quebec government said in an email Friday that monkeypox in the province is “relatively contained” despite the numbers continuing to rise.
The province said it did not keep numbers on how many of the 13,000 vaccines administered so far were to out-of-province tourists.
“In general, we recommend that people get vaccinated in their home province or region so that the vaccine has time to be effective before their visit to Quebec or Montreal,” the Department of Health wrote.
Libman said the WHO’s global emergency declaration is a “call to action” that countries need to contain it.
He says that, for now, the disease is primarily transmitted among a small segment of the population — men who report sex with men — making it controllable as long as health officials act quickly.
But he notes that anyone can contract monkeypox, which is spread through prolonged close contact through respiratory droplets, direct contact with skin lesions or body fluids, or through contaminated clothing or bedding.
This means that if left unchecked, it will “inevitably” spread to other groups, including households, he said.
Most of the men queuing in Montreal said they weren’t too worried about monkeypox or the WHO announcement.
“For me it’s more about prevention, but you never know,” said Mario Thouin, a resident of Drummondville, Que.
Twenty-three-year-old Isaiah Hagerman said he was already considering getting vaccinated, but the WHO announcement gave him the push he needed.
“If someone gave me a flyer maybe a week ago, I probably would have passed,” he said.
Maci, for his part, said he was encouraged by the warm welcome he received in Montreal, as well as the community effort to protect people.
“(Monkeypox) doesn’t scare me for that,” he said, gesturing toward the pink and blue tents. “New York is stressful.”