Many of the cases identified in people in the United States have been linked to travel to Europe, where most infections have been detected, although the CDC warns that the virus appears to be spreading locally, too. Monkeypox is easier to contain than highly contagious strains of the coronavirus circulating because it is comparatively difficult to spread. The organizations are mindful of not creating panic. An LGBT community center in South Florida scheduled a town hall meeting on monkeypox ahead of next weekend's Stonewall Pride Parade and Street Festival after local authorities identified multiple cases. The hookup app Grindr issued two alerts about monkeypox in recent weeks. Staff members from a clinic serving gay men in Chicago added monkeypox prevention to their usual public health outreach at the International Mr. LGBT organizations are mobilizing to deliver the message themselves.
"It's really important from the public health perspective for us to make sure that populations that may be more in harm's way because of how this started are aware of the risk, as well as how to keep themselves healthy," said Demetre Daskalakis, who leads the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's division of HIV/AIDS prevention and is involved in monkeypox outreach. Even if monkeypox does not pose a mortal threat akin to HIV, health officials don't want to ignore any emerging disease threat disproportionately affecting gay men.
The strain of monkeypox driving the current outbreak is rarely deadly and causes an illness lasting several weeks, unlike AIDS, which is incurable and was often lethal before effective treatments emerged in the 1990s. Activists say public health officials failed to act with urgency as HIV decimated gay communities in the 1980s and gay men were blamed for the epidemic. The early days of the AIDS epidemic weigh on public health and LGBT advocates responding to monkeypox. But they also want to avoid creating a false impression that monkeypox is a gay disease. Officials nationally want gay and bisexual men to be alert for symptoms, particularly rashes and lesions on or near the genitals, as they travel, party and congregate in June for LGBT Pride month, which commemorates the 1969 Stonewall uprising in New York that marked a seminal moment in the fight for LGBT rights. "The virus, of course, doesn't see sexual orientation." "We don't need to put rainbows all over and make clear it's only for because it's not," said Nicholas Rupp, who oversees public outreach for the Salt Lake County Health Department. The warning didn't say anything about the gay community. At a booth during the Utah Pride Festival in Salt Lake City this month, Health Department staff distributed business-card-sized monkeypox warnings urging people to avoid close or sexual contact with anyone experiencing a rash or flu-like symptoms. In Salt Lake County, health officials consulted with advocacy groups and decided to get the message out to gay and bisexual men without making the message about them. It's something never recognized before in outbreaks of the virus. cases in which the sexual behavior of the patient is known, all but one involve men who have sex with men, mirroring trends in Europe. As the United States confronts its largest-ever monkeypox outbreak, with nearly 50 probable cases, public health authorities navigate a delicate but familiar balancing act. It's not just Utah officials who are struggling to find the right message. Subscribe to The Post Most newsletter for the most important and interesting stories from The Washington Post. But they feared unintended consequences: heterosexuals assuming they're not susceptible, closeted men in a heavily Mormon community avoiding care so they're not seen as gay, and critics exploiting the infections to sow bigotry. They wanted to warn men who have sex with men that they were at higher risk for exposure to the virus.
Officials in the Utah county faced a dilemma. Monkeypox had arrived in Salt Lake County, with two men testing positive after returning from Europe, the epicenter of a global outbreak concentrated in gay and bisexual men.