What Should Worry Most Americans About Our Monkeypox Response
Seventy-eight days and more than 7,000 documented cases into the United States’ 2022 outbreak of monkeypox, federal officials have declared the disease a nationwide public-health emergency. With COVID-19 (you know, the other ongoing viral public-health emergency) still very much raging, the U.S. is officially in the midst of two infectious-disease crises, and must now, with limited funds, wrangle both at once.
The two viruses and diseases are starkly different, as are the demographics of the populations most at risk. But simultaneous outbreaks will compete for overlapping sets of resources, and put a subset of people at especially high peril of contracting viruses, perhaps even in some cases simultaneously. They will also demand distinct responses, from both the nation’s leaders and the public. For most Americans, today’s declaration changes little: The take-home can be “don’t panic,” says Taison Bell, a critical-care and infectious-disease physician at UVA Health. Avoid stigmatizing men who have sex with men, who remain at risk, but “be aware that everyone is at risk.” Today on a press call HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra urged every American “to take monkeypox seriously and to take responsibility to
