Serrin Ruggles, the director of operations at San Luis Obispo’s Gala Pride and Diversity Center, remembers being gripped by fear when news of monkeypox first broke across the nation a month ago.
“I just had this terrible sinking feeling in my chest,” said Ruggles, who uses nonbinary pronouns. “I’ve read a lot on the AIDS crisis. … I just started crying. I was so worried we were going to be thrown right back to 1983 and be reliving it all, all over again. We lost so many people in the last generation, and I was scared that it was going to happen in this generation.”
Their anxiety stemmed from a combination of factors: concern that monkeypox disproportionately affects men who have sex with other men (MSM population), worry that public health departments would be slow to react to a potentially ballooning infection rate, and an unease that general misinformation about the disease could further stigmatize queer people.
But while American health leaders largely remained silent for years before sounding the alarm about the HIV/AIDS epidemic, efforts to mitigate monkeypox at the local level gave Ruggles some hope.
“The fact that the SLO Public Health Department reached out to me … a couple of hours after I first really heard about what was going on, that felt like a game changer to me. That felt like we were less alone this time around. As they walked me through all the data and helped me set up the event, and we did the informational session, I feel a lot more secure now,” they said.
Through such a partnership, Ruggles and the Gala team hosted a virtual town hall meeting on Aug. 5 with county health officials prepared to serve as point people for members of the LGBTQ-plus community grappling with how monkeypox can affect their lives.
Rare and belonging to the same family of virus that causes smallpox, monkeypox is an infectious disease that causes rashes around the groin and hands, feet, chest, face, or mouth. Other symptoms include respiratory ailments, fever, chills, and swollen lymph nodes. While it is sexually transmissible, it is not classified as a sexually transmitted infection because it can be spread through simpler means, too, like touching objects and fabrics that have been used by someone with monkeypox and through respiratory secretions.
However, monkeypox data from the California Department of Public Health shows that MSMs are the most vulnerable demographic in terms of infection rates. As of Aug. 18, the state reported 2,660 total positive cases. Of these, 86.4 percent are from the MSM population. SLO and Santa Barbara counties reported one and five positive cases, respectively. But with article after article pointing out MSM as being behind the monkeypox spread, Ruggles is worried about potential discrimination.
“A lot of the fear is that this will go ignored because the AIDS crisis went ignored for a long time. It wasn’t until we were seeing its effects in white, cisgender, heterosexual children specifically that we saw any kind of significant governmental response to it. There is also concern that the stigmatization of the disease will increase the spread,” they said.
Ruggles added that some of the biggest misconceptions that SLO Public Health addressed at the town hall meeting were comparisons to COVID-19.
“A lot of the misinformation comes from this being a developing situation. I’ve heard people be concerned about needing to continue to wear masks because monkeypox can be spread through water droplets. But they [SLO Public Health] were able to tell us that it really takes quite a long time for monkeypox to be transmitted in that way,” Ruggles said. “You have to be having a very close conversation with somebody for an extended period of time. It’s not like COVID.”
Ruggles and other members of Gala are now encouraging support for domestic vaccine production at the federal level. Currently, the two-dose monkeypox vaccine called JYNNEOS is manufactured by a Denmark-based company called Bavarian Nordic, and the U.S. has a stockpile of 1,000 doses. Penny Borenstein, the SLO County public health director, told New Times that as of Aug. 18, the department had 24 JYNNEOS vaccines, and it anticipates receiving more. She mentioned that people under 45 years old bear the highest risk of contracting monkeypox, but the county will not cut off vaccination eligibility at that age.
“Right now, we’re only providing it to those [above 18 years] who have known contact with a case or who were in a setting where there was known to be monkeypox or maybe a lot of intimate contact but not necessarily known whether there was contact with a particular person with a case,” she said. “Also, lab workers. In our county, we’re the only laboratory that we know of locally that are testing for this virus.”
Recent research also shows that monkeypox can be caught through pets, like dogs. Borenstein recommended that infected people isolate from their pets at home, the same way they’d separate themselves from other members of their household. She added that Public Health plans on partnering with Gala and Access Support Network to expand vaccine availability. For now, Borenstein said, monkeypox isn’t considered an epidemic because of the low number of infections.
Other leaders also have plans in motion to safeguard the LGBTQ-plus community from being negatively affected by monkeypox misconceptions. State Sen. John Laird (D-Santa Cruz) who represents the 17th District that includes SLO County, sits on the Select Committee on Monkeypox with fellow Sens. Scott Weiner (D-San Francisco), Susan Eggman (D-Stockton), Rosilicie Ochoa Bogh (R-Yucaipa), Lena Gonzalez (D-Long Beach), and Richard Pan (D-Sacramento).
“The initial concrete plan was to highlight the absence of good care, the stigma, the lack of education, the lack of adequate vaccines, and any other related issue in a way that we could put pressure to have them [medical officials] come around and to have there be a better response,” Laird told New Times.
In 1983, Laird became the first openly gay mayor in the country as Santa Cruz’s top official. He then became a founding member of the Santa Cruz AIDS Project (SCAP), and vividly remembers being in the thick of the HIV/AIDS epidemic.
Laird mentioned Vito Russo, who wrote the book The Celluloid Closet about LGBTQ-plus portrayal in movies. During the AIDS crisis, Russo wrote a column called “Why We Fight” to encourage faster treatment plans. In it, Russo quoted from a New York Times article.
“I reread it recently. Two, three, four times, the New York Times said, ‘Don’t worry about HIV, it hasn’t reached the general population.’ That was just wrong on two fronts. No. 1: Was everyone then, with that view, and monkeypox now chopped liver politically or culturally?” Laird said. “Second, it didn’t face the real issue: this is about the spread of a particular virus and needs to be stopped.” Δ
Reach Staff Writer Bulbul Rajagopal at brajagopal@newtimesslo.com.
This article appears in Aug 25 – Sep 4, 2022.