It was a bit of a setback,” says Oli Kasin, sitting in his Peckham flat with mild flu symptoms, 24 hours after receiving his first shot at Guy’s Hospital Visitor Center on Sunday.
Just eight months ago, the 32-year-old was having his third bout of Covid. But this time, it’s a different virus Kasin and his friends find themselves queuing for hours for protection: monkeypox, a smallpox-like virus that the World Health Organization declared an emergency this week global health, its highest alert, after more than 16,000. cases were identified in 75 countries, including five deaths. Symptoms vary but can include a flu-like illness and skin rashes, with one in 10 cases requiring hospital care and extreme cases leading to painful, exploding skin lesions that leave the victim.”[screaming] in a loud voice of pain”.
Although Covid is spread through the air, experts say that monkeypox is mainly transmitted through skin-to-skin forms of contact, such as sex, kissing and direct contact with the infectious rash, scabs or body fluids. Since the outbreak was first reported in May, most infections outside Africa, where the virus has been a concern for years, have occurred among men who have sex with men (MSM), raising concerns among the LGBTQ+ community in particular. Gay, bisexual and queer men currently account for 98% of cases in the UK.
“The idea that we’re going to have to go through another possible pandemic is a little bit daunting … but it probably seems more like the fear of HIV and what that did to the gay community,” says Kasin, who was among hundreds. of mostly gay men queuing for more than two hours to get vaccinated in London this weekend.
Oli Kasin queued in London to receive the smallpox vaccine
/ It was Kasi
He says the atmosphere was mixed; in many ways, it was “funny” and “showed the best of the gay community: that we’re at the peak of our health, that we care about ourselves and others” (“Part of me wondered if I’d find my future husband” ). But others say it brought back chilling images of waiting rooms during the AIDS epidemic of the 1980s, and many of his comments speak to wider fears echoing around the world at the moment.
After two years of the world coming to a standstill due to a contagious virus, could we really be on the cusp of another? Could this rekindle the stigma around gay communities like the HIV/AIDS epidemic did 40 years ago? And does this stigma pose serious risks to efforts to contain it?
For virologists around the world, there are two key facts about monkeypox that are immediately reassuring: first, monkeypox is not a new disease like Covid was, so we know more about it from the beginning ; secondly, it can be prevented with a smallpox vaccine, so a method of protection already exists and therefore most people in the UK over 50 should already have protection.
But it is not without concerns and unknowns. Recent weeks have seen an unprecedented rise in cases of the disease, with more than 18,000 infections confirmed worldwide and at least 2,000 confirmed cases in the UK alone. Earlier this year, one British child among the 20 reported cases in the UK was reported to be in a critical condition and experts are advising the public to be aware of new skin rashes or bumps, but also the other possible causes, such as shingles. , STIs, chicken pox, bed bugs or insect bites.
Among those who have been diagnosed with monkeypox, London has quickly been singled out as Britain’s epicenter. The “majority” of the UK’s 2,050 known cases have been found in London and some of these patients receive medical care in specialist infectious disease units at the Royal Free Hospital and Guy’s and St Thomas’, two of the hospitals that are now part of of The NHS vaccination programme, which was stepped up last week. Last weekend, more than 1,000 vaccines were delivered to clinics across the capital.
People line up to receive their monkey pox vaccines at Guys Hospital
/ Getty Images
Most experts say they are not worried about a global monkeypox pandemic on the scale of Covid, but naturally the rising numbers and a new state of emergency have raised concerns. Could it be the next pandemic? How is it affecting LGBT+ communities, who may already feel more marginalized in society than most? And if it’s not only transmitted through sex, but also through touch, why aren’t others outside of that community more concerned?
Among the scientific and medical communities, the overwhelming consensus is that while this smallpox outbreak may be worrisome, there is little or no risk of it becoming the next Covid. “Don’t fall into fear … this is not Covid,” was the message of Faheem Younus, head of infectious diseases at the University of Maryland this week, insisting that the risk of lockdowns due to the increase in cases of monkey pox was “0 percent.” “. Tweeting to her 512,000 followers, she listed the reasons why: monkeypox isn’t new, it’s not usually deadly, it’s less contagious than Covid, it’s been around for five decades and it’s preventable with a smallpox vaccine . Dr Gareth Nye, a specialist in endocrinology at Chester Medical School, agrees. “Essentially, it doesn’t spread as fast [as coronavirus] and so it’s easier to control,” he says, noting that its obvious and painful symptoms make people at least more likely to know they have it.
Ironically, it’s actually Covid that could be (in part) responsible for the rise in smallpox numbers, he continues. “Our immune systems have broken down and are not used to fighting disease, so many of us have caught colds.”
Dr Mark Lawton, consultant to the British Association for Sexual Health and HIV, suggests there are reasons why we haven’t heard about this before. First, public awareness of viruses increased after the Covid pandemic; and second, scary headlines about monkey pox and widely shared photos of its symptoms make more people likely to be aware of the particular symptoms to look for. Most years the UK often sees a few cases, he notes, but these usually don’t make the headlines and some may go undiagnosed.
So what’s the concern, if the symptoms are usually relatively mild and unlikely to become a pandemic? Lawton says his main concerns are twofold: first, the increased pressure on already stretched NHS services, particularly sexual health clinics. If symptoms of smallpox are identified in a patient, staff will need to take special care with PPE, as it is a disease that is transmitted by skin-to-skin contact. “It simply slows down the process,” he says. “We need immediate action from the Government to fund additional resources.”
But Lawton’s broader concern is stigmatizing already stigmatized areas of health care and already stigmatized people. Although monkeypox is not technically an STI, it can be transmitted through sexual contact, and there is always a particular anxiety around any disease that is transmitted in this way. “The last thing we want to do is create more stigma or fear around STDs. The key to stopping the spread is for people to come forward – if we push the stigma, it could mean people don’t come forward.” .
Members of London’s LGBTQ+ community agree. While Kasin is happy to be open about his sexuality and his views on vaccination on social media, many friends are not. “A lot of people I know say if they tested positive [for monkeypox] they wouldn’t feel comfortable telling their employers. There’s definitely a fear of being treated differently because it’s through sex,” she says.
Some are worried that monkeypox could rekindle the stigma around gay communities like the HIV/AIDS epidemic did 40 years ago.
/ Corbis via Getty Images
Josh Hopkins, 27, a trainee solicitor from west London, agrees. She had to call her local clinic 15 times on Monday before getting an appointment for a shot, and says there is fear and frustration that monkeypox is not taken as seriously as other viruses because of the community affected. Just look at how the word about the Covid jab spread, he says, pointing to the nationwide push to get the population hooked, from celebrity videos to personal text messages. This time her GP hasn’t been in touch to offer the shot and half her friends didn’t know about the new drop-in centers and monkey pox clinics in London until she tweeted the number of the quote line. “It looks like we had to proactively search [the vaccine] out to ourselves.”
Like Kasin, Hopkins has dozens of friends who queued up to four hours for a shot on Sunday, and they’re the lucky ones who live in London. The monkeypox jab is not yet available in other parts of the country, so a friend from Birmingham had to travel to the capital to get the jab last weekend.
Experts are already warning that it could take more than a year to get this particular outbreak of monkeypox under control, because they and their colleagues “really missed the boat on being able to put a lid on the outbreak earlier.” “You’d think we would have learned lessons from Covid and tried to stop something new early on,” says Hopkins, asking why GPs still don’t seem to be actively promoting the vaccine, despite official guidelines saying “your local NHS services will contact you and offer you a vaccine.”
But taking this virus less seriously is only half of Kasin and Hopkins’ concern. The other is who will take the blame if it increases. As a gay man, Hopkins says he sees the dark side of the “horrible culture war against queer people” every day and has already seen “stupid tweets” about monkey pox being a “gay virus.” Anti-vaxxers have been sharing conspiracy theories about Bill Gates and the monkey pox vaccine being the Covid vaccine in disguise. “I know I’m early, but I’m against monkey pox too,” actor Laurence Fox tweeted when the outbreak…