It's been a minute since we've had a global health crisis, so you have to forgive the CDC for not nailing its messaging on the monkeypox outbreak.
A kissing cousin to smallpox, monkeypox has been around since the 1950s but made its modern (extra-Africa) debut in a sauna (most likely a gay bathhouse) in Spain this May.
Officials were hesitant to overreact, being fresh off a COVID outbreak that crippled the global economy, but also because it might have put a damper on Pride Month. Nothing like a virus spread through skin-to-skin contact to ruin the celebratory mood.
But now that June is behind us, the World Health Organization is taking the bears by their ball gags in declaring Monkeypox a full blown "global health emergency"--among gay men.
“Although I am declaring a public health emergency of international concern," WHO director-general Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said, "for the moment this is an outbreak that is concentrated among men who have sex with men, especially those with multiple sexual partners.”
It's nothing to be ashamed of--well maybe just a little bit--it's just a fact that 98% of Monkeypox infections are among gay men. You can assume the other 2% are women having breakthrough sessions with their marriage counselors right now.
Will it spread to people that aren't men who have sex with men? Maybe, but if you don't tell people who's spreading it, it's difficult to stop.
To their credit, the WHO has no problem telling people that Monkeypox is essentially Dong COVID. But the U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention is still dragging its feet, issuing health guidance on literally everything but gay sex.
It cautions against touching infected bed sheets, as if gay saunas have beds. It warns against handling "dead rodents," as if that's the mouse that's out of the house causing all this trouble. "Wash your hands," they say. "No hugging!" Hands off other people's "sex toys and fetish gear!" CDC can tell people to avoid raves and parties "where there is minimal clothing." It can discourage hanging out in "enclosed spaces, such as back rooms, saunas, and sex clubs." It can recommend "virtual sex," "masturbating together at a distance of at least 6 feet," and having sex with your clothes on.
But it can't say "gay." The single common denominator in 98% of cases: not a word.
It's bizarre, and yet not entirely surprising.
This is the same CDC that admitted to the fact that 94% of COVID deaths were among people with one or more comorbidities--the majority of them weight-related (heart disease, hypertension, diabetes, chronic kidney disease)--but couldn't be bothered to tell people that they should start trying to be less obese.
It's not that CDC has an aversion to butt stuff. It's that they're afraid of offending someone, and the officials, doctors, researchers, and staff have collectively decided that it's worse to say "fuck less" than it is to provide sound health guidance.
The CDC is simply too woke to tell people the truth.
Exemplifying modern society's fear of facts, the New York City Health Commission is lobbying the WHO to change how it refers to Monkeypox, because of...you guessed it...racism.
The term "Monkeypox," the health commissioner wrote, may reignite "traumatic feelings of racism and stigma--particularly for Black people and other people of color."
If I ever meet a Black person I'm going to ask them how they feel about these do-gooder Democrats constantly protecting them from invisible insults. It's like the trope that Blacks aren't smart enough to get an ID to vote, though not quite as racist as comparing Hispanics to tacos.
"To reduce confusion," because apparently Black folks are like toddlers wandering around in a house of mirrors, the NYC health commission wants to call Monkeypox "hMPXV," which means the same thing, contains the same "racist primate," and literally stands for "human MonkeyPoX Virus" but is somehow less confusing than calling the thing by the name we've been calling it for 60 years.
The CDC is literally trying to pray the gay away, and it's not helping.
Nick Wilbur writes political opinion and satire at http://ConservativeNM.com.