The recent proliferation of so-called monkeypox cases among humans has raised a debate about the risk of discriminatory interpretations associated with the disease. As the first cases in Western countries are mostly recorded among homosexuals or bisexuals, health officials fear the emergence of homophobic comments that could hamper the fight against the disease, as with other viruses in the past.
The recent proliferation of so-called monkeypox cases among humans has raised a debate about the risk of discriminatory interpretations associated with the disease. As the first cases in Western countries are mostly recorded among homosexuals or bisexuals, health officials fear the emergence of homophobic comments that could hamper the fight against the disease, as with other viruses in the past.
“It could be the beginning of an epidemic that could eventually spread among gay people. [por] With this sentence, Vitor Duque, president of the Portuguese Virology Society, tried to summarize the emergence of cases of monkeypox in the West. In an interview with CNN Portugal last week, he said the virus is contagious. transmitted “between men at this time”, through close contacts.
Duque was referring to the fact that most victims of monkeypox in Portugal are gay or bisexual. A point raised without much fanfare by the UK health oversight agency (UKHSA), which identified this common denominator in many of the first cases recorded in the region.
Also, over the weekend, Belgium announced that three cases had been registered among attendees of the Darkland festival, a fetish event in the country mostly attended by the gay community. In Spain, Elena Andradas, director general of Madrid’s public health service, also reported in local media that the first people to become infected were men who had “had sex with other men in the past few weeks.”
But as Andy Seale, the World Health Organization’s (WHO) global strategy advisor for HIV, hepatitis and sexually transmitted infection programs, points out, it is too early to draw any conclusions on the matter. “Even if we see some cases among men who have sex with men, it’s not a gay disease because some people on social media have tried to label it,” he warns. “Anyone can get flowers from monkeys through close contact,” he explains.
Infection of early cases of monkeypox results from direct contact with blood, bodily fluids or lesions on the skin or mucous membranes of infected animals. Secondary transmission, i.e. person-to-person, can result from close contact with infected secretions from the respiratory tract (coughing and sneezing), skin lesions of an infected individual, or contact with objects that have recently been contaminated with a patient’s biological fluids (blood, saliva). .
Contact with infected people’s clothing, linens, and bath towels can also be a vector. The possibility of sexual transmission is still under investigation.
Even so, officials fear that statements like the president of the Portuguese Virology Society will add to the stigma of some of the population, as happened in the 1980s when the HIV/AIDS epidemic broke out. . Because at the time, it was the gay community that was first affected by the virus and quickly discriminated against. One of the consequences was that the rest of the population was not interested in prevention, believing that they were not part of what was considered a “risk group” at the time.
The disease can strike anyone.
“These stigmatizations and accusations undermine trust and the ability to respond effectively to epidemics like this,” said Matthew Kavanagh, deputy director of UNAIDS. When discriminatory comments mean that warnings from the scientific community are not heard by the rest of the population, this is precisely based on the agency’s experience in combating AIDS.
The UNAIDS representative says these attacks “encourage ineffective coercive measures”. Kavanagh insists that monkeypox is a “all-hit” disease, even as WHO and national health officials confirm that more gay men and men who have sex with men are among the infected.
Nearly 200 cases of monkeypox have been confirmed in some Western countries since the beginning of May. Named after it was discovered in a laboratory monkey in Denmark in 1958, the virus was first recorded in humans in 1970 in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Since then, human contamination has occurred mainly on the African continent or has almost always been sporadically imported from this part of the world.
Monkeypox is manifested by skin lesions. “It looks like chickenpox, but it’s a little more serious. People usually recover, but they can have sequelae,” Jeanne Brugère-Picoux, a member of the French Academy of Medicine and professor of veterinary medicine, explains in an interview. with RFI. “The virus can be particularly serious in between 1% and 10% of cases in the youngest age, and can even cause death in people with sensitive health or those with young children,” the expert concludes.
But the WHO said Monday that human-to-human transmission of monkeypox “could be stopped in non-endemic countries”. “We want to stop person-to-person transmission. We can do this in non-endemic countries… It’s a controllable situation,” said Maria Van Kerkhove, director of the fight against Covid-19 at the institution. it is also responsible for the fight against emerging diseases and zoonoses.
source: Noticias
