San Francisco, New York state declare monkeypox emergencies as outbreak grows

[BumRushDaShow]

Source: Washington Post

San Francisco and the state of New York declared public health emergencies Thursday amid the growing monkeypox outbreak, the latest in escalating measures in response to the rapidly spreading virus. The action by two of the hardest-hit areas comes after the World Health Organization declared a global emergency this past weekend and as the Biden administration weighs a national emergency declaration.

More than 40 percent of the nation’s confirmed 4,907 monkeypox cases have been reported in California and New York. San Francisco Mayor London Breed (D) announced a local public health emergency Thursday, noting that cases of monkeypox had nearly doubled, to 261, in a week. She said the move would mobilize resources, accelerate emergency planning and allow for future spending to be reimbursed by the state and federal governments.

California state Sen. Scott Wiener (D), who had called for the emergency declaration, said the decision would make it easier to expand testing and vaccines and pressure the federal government to take the outbreak more seriously. “It’s a powerful declaration to the country and the world about the need to act decisively and strongly,” Wiener said in an interview. After the state of New York recorded more than 1,200 cases, State Health Commissioner Mary T. Bassett on Thursday declared an imminent threat to public health, retroactive to June 1.

“This declaration means that local health departments engaged in response and prevention activities will be able to access additional State reimbursement, after other Federal and State funding sources are maximized, to protect all New Yorkers and ultimately limit the spread of monkeypox in our communities,” Bassett said in a news release.

Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2022/07/28/monkeypox-emergency-san-francisco-new-york/

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As note (and fortunately this article was a rare one that didn't do it but)... I wish they would stop calling the vaccine "monkeypox vaccine". It's a "smallpox vaccine" which has been found to be effective for use with monkeypox.

[msongs]

1. yahoo - here's why we should stop calling it monkeypox ...

https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/why-stop-calling-monkeypox-000008067.html

[BumRushDaShow]

13. Thank you for this because I saw elsewhere which referred to it as ORTHOPOX

[Igel]

17. Orthopoxvirus is the genus.

Cowpox, chickenpox, buffalopox, camelpox and smallpox are also orthopox. Calling monkeypox "orthopox" is like saying we shouldn't call lead "lead" but metal, because that's what it really is.

"There's metal in your kid's blood" becomes too ambiguous. I mean, iron's also a metal and you can be told you can't donate blood if you don't have adequate amounts of metal in your blood. In an established context, fine--but first you have to refer to the thing's actual name to establish that content.

[BumRushDaShow]

19. The problem here is that from what I gather, the usual "monkeypox"

has mutated into whatever this is, which isn't behaving like what is "typical". So I would prefer they get more generic. It is bad enough calling the vaccine that people are receiving "monkeypox vaccine" when it is a SMALLPOX vaccine.

An as a note, I am a retired chemist who used to work for one of the HHS health agencies so am not completely clueless but am concerned with the past 2 years of a mess with "messaging" and how the media butchers it.

[YoshidaYui]

2. we were the first place to get COvid 2 so why not this

its bad enough knowing this shit is out there as well.

[Rhiannon12866]

4. Yup, both coasts, lucky us!

[YoshidaYui]

8. Years ago when they kept asking where would covid 2 hit.. my first thought was San Francisco

We are pretty international... and sure enough..now this shit,, nothing to prevent this? i will not touch anyone and always wear a mask.

[Rhiannon12866]

9. It hit the West Coast from China and NYC from Italy, and then spread

Both coasts get all the travelers from overseas...

[yaesu]

3. according to the cdc Monkeypox was discovered in 1958 when two outbreaks of a pox-like disease

occurred in colonies of monkeys kept for research. This makes me wonder what kind of research and was it possibly lab created? Would be interesting to research that if I had the time which I don't.

[Lulu KC]

14. There is some info in the article about that

which I skimmed. It was actually pretty interesting.

[Igel]

18. Not lab created.

Not even normal in the species of monkey it was discovered in--these critters were from SE Asia.

It's endemic to West/Central Africa, mostly found in a variety of squirrels and in a kind of rat.

[yaesu]

5. Monkeypox spreads in different ways. The virus can spread from person-to-person

through direct contact with the infectious rash, scabs, or body fluids. It also can be spread by respiratory secretions during prolonged, face-to-face contact, or during intimate physical contact, such as kissing, cuddling, or sex. In addition, pregnant people can spread the virus to their fetus through the placenta.

Touching items (such as clothing or linens) that previously touched the infectious rash or body fluids is another way monkeypox spreads. It’s also possible for people to get monkeypox from infected animals, either by being scratched or bitten by the animal or by eating meat or using products from an infected animal.

People who do not have monkeypox symptoms cannot spread the virus to others.


https://www.cdc.gov/poxvirus/monkeypox/faq.html

[Grokenstein]

11. Rightwankers are furiously spreading disinfo (go figure)

Some are pushing the "it spreads primarily/exclusively among teh gayz" nonsense (you know, like they did with AIDS), others are playing the "it's no worse than a bad cold" crap (you know, like they did with...sorry, like they continue to do with COVID-19), and the really shitty creeps are serving up the combo platter.

Golly, it's almost as if they want it to spread!

[Mosby]

16. About 99% of infected people are men.

We report 528 infections diagnosed between April 27 and June 24, 2022, at 43 sites in 16 countries. Overall, 98% of the persons with infection were gay or bisexual men, 75% were White, and 41% had human immunodeficiency virus infection; the median age was 38 years.

https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2207323#figures_media

https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2207323

[Grokenstein]

20. AIDS was a "gay disease" too...until it wasn't.

https://www.wfyi.org/news/articles/indiana-health-officials-monkeypox-cases-include-women-and-children

https://www.newsweek.com/fauci-monkeypox-risk-pregnant-women-children-cases-vaccine-1728257

However, experts have said that anyone can get monkeypox and that its spread is not limited to sexual contact between men, nor does it spread solely through sexual contact at all.

"It's the close contact that matters, not the sexual activity itself," Rowland Kao, Sir Timothy O'Shea Professor of Veterinary Epidemiology and Data Science at the University of Edinburgh, told Newsweek last week.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) states that monkeypox spreads through direct contact with the infectious rash it causes, as well as through prolonged face-to-face contact, contact with contaminated objects, and contact with infected animals. Pregnant women can also spread the virus to their fetus.

[Mosby]

21. They are both STIs

We describe a human monkeypox case series that includes 528 infections from four WHO regions (Europe, Americas, Western Pacific, and Eastern Mediterranean) and 16 countries reported over a 2-month period. Sexual activity, largely among gay or bisexual men, was by far the most frequently suspected route of transmission. The strong likelihood of sexual transmission was supported by the findings of primary genital, anal, and oral mucosal lesions, which may represent the inoculation site. Monkeypox virus DNA that was detectable by PCR in seminal fluid in 29 of the 32 cases in which seminal fluid was tested further supports this hypothesis. However, whether semen is capable of transmitting infection remains to be investigated, since it is unknown whether the viral DNA detected in these specimens was replication competent. Reports of clusters associated with sex parties or saunas further underscore the potential role of sexual contact as a promoter of transmission. International travel and attendance at large gatherings linked to sex-on-site activities may explain the global spread of monkeypox infections amplified through sexual networks.

[Grokenstein]

23. "Is Monkeypox an STD? That's the Wrong Question."

You're working very hard to convince people to not take this seriously. Why is that?

https://newrepublic.com/article/167195/monkeypox-std-wrong-question

Arguments over whether monkeypox is an STD or not—or whether you can get it in passing at the laundromat or from sewer rats—can obscure the real issues. “I was overwhelmed by the amount of focus on this STI-versus-non-STI framing; [by] the fact that people are not outraged that vaccines, for instance, were sitting in Denmark for a month or two,” Oni Blackstock, a physician and executive director of Health Justice, told me. “The focus should really be on holding government accountable and getting them to increase the urgency with which they’re reacting to this outbreak.”

The bottom line, experts I’ve interviewed said, is that this outbreak is young and we still don’t know everything monkeypox may capable of. If we act now, swiftly and decisively, we won’t need to find out.

[Mosby]

24. The death toll so far of this monkeypox outbreak is zero.

Maybe you need to dial it back a bit.

[Grokenstein]

25. I'm not the one aligned with MTG on the subject.

You know, the whole "It's a gay STI" bit. But you do you, boo.

https://www.advocate.com/news/2022/7/25/rep-marjorie-taylor-greene-tweets-monkeypox-disinformation

https://www.vice.com/en/article/88qqaa/monkeypox-grooming-conspiracy

[Beachnutt]

6. If I understand this right the vaccine is only effective

if you are vaccinated before you catch it,
Once you have m pox the vaccine is ineffective and you must be treated with two doses of TPOXX daily for 14 days.

[MichMan]

7. Need a Federal travel advisory against non essential travel in and out of either state

to try and contain it from spreading. Anyone that had been to either California or NY should be required to quarantine for 10 days.

[Lucky Luciano]

10. Disagree. This is not airborne and transmission only happens when symptomatic.

Covid is such an awful virus because it spread so silently while people were asymptomatic while also being airborne.

[Shanti Shanti Shanti]

12. "98% of patients are men who had sex with men", they always leave that part out

[DakotaSnow]

15. Unfortunate details

[orangecrush]

22. This sucks.

Thank you Democratic voters for putting a competent President in office before this happened.

I shudder to think of what it would be like with his predecessor.

[Jose Garcia]

26. Back to social distancing?

[BlueTsunami2018]

27. Nah, it's spreads through bodily fluid exchange.

Or direct contact with the sores and rash that the disease itself causes.

Sex seems to be the easiest way to spread it around.

[Jose Garcia]

28. It's a lot harder to exchange bodily fluids when you are practicing social distancing

[BlueTsunami2018]

29. Well, that's true.

But there is a bit of a difference between getting it on with someone and being six feet away from them. Haha!

[madville]

30. The most at-risk group should be abstaining

From close, intimate contact for the next month or two, that seems like the obvious way to limit the spread since 98% of cases are gay/bisexual men who recently had sex with other men. That guidance can be very targeted.

Officials in these areas have stated the vaccines will be offered to gay/bisexual men first since that is the group primarily affected. Abstaining from close physical contact will be most effective, followed by not having sex with multiple partners, and possibly vaccination.