“It was the worst pain I’ve ever experienced in my life,” says 26-year-old New Yorker Kyle Planck, recalling his recent monkeypox infection.
Though anyone can contract monkeypox, Planck first became aware of the virus in the spring, when authorities said many of the early cases in Europe and America were in men who have sex with men.
“I was a bit concerned that it would eventually affect us here in the United States, especially as a member of the LGBTQ+ community,” he recalls.
At the end of June, says the doctoral student in pharmacology, he became very ill.
Fever, swollen lymph nodes and a negative Covid-19 test led him to suspect it could be monkeypox.
A doctor told him to wait and see how his symptoms develop, but after four days of fever he developed patches that left him in no doubt.
“They had started on my arms and hands and spread all over my body over the course of a day.
“I had about 30 lesions at that point,” he says at his Queens home.
Planck was able to get tested on July 5 and the following day began treatment with TPOXX, or Tecovirimat, an antiviral drug originally used against human smallpox but approved in a study against monkeypox.
Planck admits that the proximity to the medical community made it easier for him to enroll in a course.
“I know that’s not the reality for most people in New York, which is really unfortunate,” he says.
Monkeypox usually goes away on its own but can be extremely painful.
Planck was in severe pain for a week, particularly from the lesions on his mucous membranes, before the medication began to ease his symptoms.
“The pain was so severe for me that I was basically taking a warm bath six or seven times a day just because it was the only thing that made me feel better,” he says.
Planck found the experience “stressful” and added to his stress was the fear of contaminating his roommate, although transmission is through close contact.
He believes his case was “relatively mild” because he could be treated and that “so many people go through worse things.”
Planck thinks US health officials were too slow to respond to the first outbreak of cases and says preventative messaging was too weak.
– vaccine doses –
“I think the government was like, ‘Let’s wait and see what happens, let’s see if this becomes a problem,’ and that really doesn’t take into account how infectious diseases work,” he says.
Planck has written several letters to elected officials urging them to increase access to the antiviral drug.
“We have millions of doses of TPOXX treatment available. And months after this outbreak, we’re still not really able to mobilize those resources,” he says.
The United States originally had 100 million doses of the ACAM2000 vaccine. It was developed to treat smallpox in humans, but it can cause significant side effects and is not recommended for people with a compromised immune system.
Only a thousand doses of the newer and safer Jynneos vaccine were available when cases began to multiply, largely because nearly 800,000 doses were blocked in Denmark pending approval by the Food and Drug Administration.
However, availability is increasing.
New York City — with 711 confirmed cases, the highest concentration number in the country — has received 21,500 doses and is awaiting delivery of another 25,000.
Appointments were made in a few minutes and long queues have formed in front of the clinics in the last few days.
“I don’t want anyone to have to go through what I went through,” Planck concludes.
#Yorkers #experience #monkeypox
