Rename virus to avoid stigmatising patients: NYC
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NEW YORK • New York City asked the World Health Organisation (WHO) on Tuesday to rename the monkeypox virus to avoid stigmatising patients who might then hold off seeking care.
New York has seen more cases of the disease - which the WHO declared a global health emergency at the weekend - than any other city in the US, with 1,092 infections detected so far.
"We have a growing concern for the potentially devastating and stigmatising effects that the messaging around the monkeypox virus can have on... already vulnerable communities," New York City public health commissioner Ashwin Vasan said in a letter to WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus dated Tuesday.
The WHO had floated the idea of changing the name of the virus, which is related to the eradicated smallpox virus, during a press conference last month, a proposal Dr Vasan mentioned in his letter.
Dr Vasan referenced the "painful and racist history within which terminology like (monkeypox) is rooted for communities of colour".
He pointed to the fact that monkeypox did not actually originate in primates, as the name might suggest, and recalled the negative effects of misinformation during the early days of the HIV epidemic and the racism faced by Asian communities that was exacerbated by former president US Donald Trump calling Covid-19 the "China virus".
"Continuing to use the term monkeypox to describe the current outbreak may reignite these traumatic feelings of racism and stigma - particularly for black people and other people of colour, as well as members of the LGBTQIA+ communities, and it is possible that they may avoid engaging in vital healthcare services because of it," Dr Vasan said.
Anyone is susceptible to contracting monkeypox, which has long been endemic in central and western Africa, but so far its spread in Europe and the United States has been mostly concentrated among men who have sex with men.
Separately, the Biden administration estimates it may need nearly US$7 billion (S$10 billion) to deal with the monkeypox outbreak in the US, The Washington Post reported on Tuesday.
The funding estimate was part of a memo marked to President Joe Biden outlining a series of options, as opposed to a formal funding request, the report said.
AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE, REUTERS