Monkeypox: WHO issues guidelines for MSM community

mambaonline.com:

The World Health Organisation (WHO) has declared the monkeypox outbreak a public health emergency and issued guidelines to tackle the spread of the virus, including empowering the LGBTQ+ community with knowledge. On Friday, the Director General of the WHO, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said that “we have an outbreak that has spread around the world rapidly, through new modes of transmission, about which we understand too little, and which meets the criteria in the International Health Regulations.” “Accordingly, for all of these reasons, I have decided that the global monkeypox outbreak represents a public health emergency of international concern.” And while monkeypox can be transmitted to anyone via close contact, Ghebreyesus stated that “for the moment this is an outbreak that is concentrated among men who have sex with men, especially those with multiple sexual partners.” He explained that as a result “this is an outbreak that can be stopped with the right strategies in the right groups.

It’s therefore essential that all countries work closely with communities of men who have sex with men, to design and deliver effective information and services, and to adopt measures that protect the health, human rights and dignity of affected communities.” Ghebreyesus also issued a comprehensive set of recommendations tailored to the scale of the outbreak in each country.

Among recommendations impacting the LGBTQ+ community, the WHO addressed concerns that gay, bi and other men who have sex with men (MSM) could face stigmatisation, resulting in infected individuals not coming forward.

The organisation stressed the importance of planning and implementing “interventions to avoid the stigmatisation and discrimination against any