This illustration shows test tubes labeled “Monkeypox virus positive” from May 23, 2022.DADO RUVIC / Reuters
Early public health messages indicating that a new outbreak of smallpox in monkeys primarily affected gay men quickly degenerated into misconceptions of this as a “gay disease,” say health experts and LGBTQ advocates, who fear that misinformation can hamper efforts to prevent the spread of the virus.
“Discrimination and stigmatization not only harm these communities, they harm our ability to fight disease,” said Timothy Caulfield, Canadian Research Chair in Health Law and Policy at the University of Alberta.
Smallpox, a rare and less serious but less serious infectious disease than smallpox, is spread through any form of close contact. Although cases are on the rise, most people recover within two to four weeks of the viral infection, which causes fever, aches and pains. Infectious disease experts point out that monkeypox is less transmissible and easier to detect and contain than COVID-19.
While health officials should reduce the risk to populations currently affected by the virus, “the big picture here is that anyone can get it,” he said. Caulfield.
The current outbreak includes 25 confirmed cases in Quebec, one confirmed and four suspected cases in Toronto, health officials said in the middle of the week. The outbreak is unusual, experts say, because the virus is spreading beyond regions where it is endemic to West and Central Africa. Many cases were identified among men who had sex with men and sought help from primary care and sexual health clinics.
“What seems to be happening now is that it has reached the population as a sexual form, as a genital form, and is spreading like sexually transmitted infections, which has amplified its transmission worldwide. said WHO adviser David Heymann. Reuters earlier this month.
During a question-and-answer session on Monday, Andy Seale, an adviser to the WHO’s HIV, Hepatitis and Sexually Transmitted Infections program, clarified how the virus is spreading.
“While, for example, we are seeing some cases between men having sex with men, this is not a‘ gay disease ’, as some people on social media have tried to label it,” Dr Seale said. “Anyone can contract monkeypox through close contact.”
While community health experts and advocates for LGBTQ people are encouraged to see a formal rejection of homophobic representations of the virus, some are concerned that early updates on the outbreak could be harmful.
“Early messages are often settled and later messages are not heard,” said Mary Fernando, an Ottawa doctor who writes about improving public health messages.
“It’s important to choose your words carefully, especially when you’re talking about groups that have the potential to be stigmatized.… We’ve seen how quickly this initial message can be used,” said Mr. Caulfield, who co-founded ScienceUpFirst, a national initiative that works with independent scientists, health experts, and other thinkers to counter misinformation.
This type of scapegoat – mistakenly associating viruses with certain groups of people – is dangerous, said Dr. Fernando. “This is reminiscent of COVID-19, where Trump called it a Chinese disease, which the rest of us thought was useless. However, this took hold and we saw an increase in anti-Asian hate and hate crimes.”
The situation echoes the early fanatical beliefs about HIV / AIDS, said Ken Monteith, executive director of COCQ-AIDS, the coalition of Quebec’s AIDS organizations.
“Attaching stigma to a disease is not a useful tool for eliminating a disease,” Mr. Monteith. “The smallpox of the monkey is a virus. It intends to reproduce, that’s all. It doesn’t matter who you are. It doesn’t matter what kind of close contact it is.”
These misconceptions can also lead to an understatement: framing monkeypox as a “gay disease” can prevent those who don’t want to identify with the gay community from reporting its symptoms, Monteith said.
At the same time, monkeypox updates that disproportionately focus on gay men “discourage everyone else from listening,” creating complacency among the population, he said.
Here are nine parallels to the false sense of security that was seen during the early waves of COVID-19: people took the idea that the virus only affected the elderly, with children and young people saved.
“We’ve found that all of this is not true,” Dr. Fernando said, noting that people want to feel safe during outbreaks. “We’re all tired of COVID, worrying about things. Is the monkey’s smallpox approaching? If I don’t have to worry about it, I’d rather have it.”
Last Saturday, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported 92 confirmed cases and 28 suspected cases of smallpox in 12 countries, although experts point out that the number has risen since then. As of Thursday, an estimated 294 confirmed and 79 suspected cases were in several non-endemic countries, including Canada, according to Moritz Kraemer, an associate professor at Oxford University who specializes in epidemiology and genomics. Dr. Kraemer works with Global. Health, a data science initiative that provides open access to real-time epidemiological data worldwide. There are no deaths, according to the WHO.
The virus is transmitted through close contact with the lesions of an infected person, body fluids, respiratory drops and contaminated clothing, bedding or utensils.
In the face of the spread of smallpox, experts urged clear, real and unjudged messages about public health.
“People need to know the symptoms; is there any treatment; if it goes away on its own, you’re still contagious, “Mr Monteith said.
Watching his social media channels, Mr. Caulfield observed that the same voices that had passed the pandemic spreading misinformation online did so again with the monkey’s smallpox.
“It was as if these receivers were ready … to keep the agenda going, that some others may be to blame for our problems,” he said. “When the stigmatization of messages plays with existing prejudices and fears, they are more likely to spread and take hold.”
Mr. Monteith put it another way: “If we had a smallpox outbreak among football moms, I don’t think we would stigmatize football moms. We are stigmatizing the gay community because we like to do it. “