The media is trying to manufacture panic over monkeypox, but it's not something that should elicit constant hysterics. Most Americans are not at risk for infection. By some headlines, you'd think that monkeypox is COVID 3.0.
Monkeypox caseloads will never reach the levels we see annually from the common cold or flu. Our children can attend school without fear. Colleges might have to be a little more vigilant since their respective student bodies are comprised of consenting adults. It's a virus that's almost exclusively impacting the LGBT community. That's a fact, but saying so could provoke the "woke" crowd who will label you homophobic. And therefore, the messaging on combating this viral outbreak is a total mess.
Monkeypox is not a national health emergency. It is an issue for some cities, like New York, Washington, D.C., and San Francisco, which are deep-blue bastions. It's a heavily localized problem, but two competing narratives exist here. One is the usual political correctness getting in the way of effectively telling members of the LGBT community to be a little more careful or perhaps even abstain from sexual activity in hotspot areas.
Here’s my radio monologue on the latest revelations, which the media has lightly covered, but without firing up the outrage amplification machine — even as a marginalized community is put at disproportionate risk by abject government incompetence: https://t.co/SJQJR9jqTr
— Guy Benson (@guypbenson) August 5, 2022
The other side to this tale is something Guy highlighted: that this is yet another health crisis that the Biden administration is bungling on a near epic scale.
The FDA rejected one million monkeypox vaccines from Europe because it couldn't inspect the facility, which the European Union already gave the stamp of approval. It's part of the ongoing theme of incompetence that has become pervasive among the Biden team. Still, this blunder will go underreported because a) Biden is a Democrat, and b) the media eschews anything that could be seen as criticizing the LGBT community or their lifestyle.
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just read the comments on this story i wrote and wheewwwwww. absolutely wild to be accused, as a gay reporter, of being anti-gay for reporting on *practical* health advice for a virus that is currently affecting MSM in 98% of known cases, including half a dozen of my own friends https://t.co/cDRRbyurLD
— David Mack (@davidmackau) July 27, 2022
The sanitized monkeypox message was that it was a virus spread by skin-to-skin contact, which means those engaging in gay sex. New data suggest the virus is spread almost exclusively by sexual transmission (via NBC News):
Since the outset of the global monkeypox outbreak in May, public health and infectious disease experts have told the public that the virus is largely transmitting through skin-to-skin contact, in particular during sex between men.
Now, however, an expanding cadre of experts has come to believe that sex between men itself — both anal as well as oral intercourse — is likely the main driver of global monkeypox transmission. The skin contact that comes with sex, these experts say, is probably much less of a risk factor.
In recent weeks, a growing body of scientific evidence — including a trio of studies published in peer-reviewed journals, as well as reports from national, regional and global health authorities — has suggested that experts may have framed monkeypox’s typical transmission route precisely backward.
Reconceiving the primary risk factors for transmission is crucial because of how it may affect guidance on reducing the risk of infection, including the question of whether demanding that people with the virus self-isolate has any substantial impact on transmission.
“A growing body of evidence supports that sexual transmission, particularly through seminal fluids, is occurring with the current MPX outbreak,” said Dr. Aniruddha Hazra, medical director of the University of Chicago Sexual Wellness Clinic, referring to monkeypox and to recent studies that found the virus in semen.
Consequently, scientists told NBC News that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other public health authorities should update their monkeypox communication strategies to more strongly emphasize the centrality of intercourse among gay and bisexual men, who comprise nearly all U.S. cases, to the virus’ spread.
This latest development about the disease will open up a new can of worms since you know practical, concise advice and protocols will get mutilated by the political correctness grinder. In the meantime, a segment of the population highly susceptible to infection will remain stranded on an island as the media, Democrats, and health experts create a messaging strategy so sanitized and overly broad that it enters the realms of the incomprehensible and pure science fiction. No, kindergartners are not at risk of monkeypox infection.
The LGBT community is at risk. It's okay to say since 90-plus percent of all cases are from people in this category. Common sense dictates that all health resources available should be devoted to these people, especially regarding vaccination.
Again, the senior citizen, those with diabetes, or other Americans living with pre-existing conditions should not get the vaccine. They're not at risk; this isn't COVID. Everyone who isn't in the LGBT community needs to stop freaking out about infection.
At the same time, maybe we could have come to this foreseeable development with the data since we've all known for weeks that monkeypox was spread by gay sex and impacting the LGBT community at insanely disproportionate rates. But again, because of stigma, no one could say that, and yet, bashing people who got COVID and died was an acceptable media activity. Funny how the rules change with the political winds, huh?
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