This week, some Manitoba men are eligible to receive a monkeypox immunization, but some advocates are concerned about the potential stigma associated with the disease, particularly for members of the LGBTQ+ community.
On Friday, Manitoba Health announced that some men who have sex with men will be able to get the vaccine if they meet one more listed criteria — including a recent diagnosis of a sexually transmitted infection, more than two sexual partners in the past 21 days, if they are prostitutes if they have recently had anonymous sex or are planning to do so.
This criterion has some members of the LGBTQ+ community and their allies worried about further persecution.
Winnipeg-based drag performer Thomas Hannan says he worries about what might happen to fellow queer men in light of monkeypox being declared a global emergency.
“If you’re someone who’s already prejudiced against our community, it’s easy to turn something like this into the LGBT community as the reason why it’s happening. And really, it’s not just about queer people … It’s not just gay people having sexual interactions,” he said in an interview Monday.
Thomas Hannan identifies as the odd man out. He worries that the province, by opening up monkeypox to certain men who have sex with men, could open them up to stigmatization. (Gary Solilak/CBC)
All monkeypox vaccine appointments provided by the province were booked by Monday afternoon, a public health spokesperson said.
The head of a Winnipeg clinic that pushed for monkeypox vaccines to be given to men who have sex with men says it’s important for people in the community to take precautions.
“While we’re concerned about stigmatizing messaging, we also want to not put ourselves in a situation where we’re so concerned about upsetting a particular community that we don’t tell them what their risk is,” said Mike Payne, executive director at Nine Circles Health Centre, which specializes in the care and treatment of people with sexually transmitted infections.
“It can certainly be uncomfortable for people because you know there’s a concern that people are going to equate being gay with high-risk behavior, which of course is not true.”
No cases of monkeypox have been reported in Manitoba to date, but other provinces and territories have reported 957 cases as of Friday, according to the Public Health Agency of Canada.
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Public health officials must balance their messaging with the important role of conveying factual information, says a University of Manitoba assistant professor of public health sciences and social work.
Rusty Suleymanov, whose research focuses on LGBTQ+ health as well as sexually transmitted infections, says government officials risk repeating the mistakes of the HIV/AIDS crisis in the 1980s.
“Focusing on how monkeypox affects different populations can be counterproductive and sometimes futile on the one hand. It really makes people who are disproportionately affected feel like it’s the end … and people may be less likely to seek help because of that stigma,” he said.
“On the other hand, it leads those who may have been less affected to falsely believe that they are less vulnerable.” So it’s a really big problem.”
Rusty Suleymanov is an Assistant Professor in the Faculty of Social Work at the University of Manitoba researching LGBTQ+ issues. (Submitted by Rusty Suleymanov)
Paine echoes this concern.
When it comes to HIV and AIDS, men who have sex with men are overrepresented in Canada, but not in Manitoba and Saskatchewan, where intravenous drug use is the biggest indicator of HIV and AIDS, he said.
Payne worries that people will focus on the labels of gay, bisexual and men who have sex with men, rather than the lifestyle that may make people vulnerable to monkeypox.
“Some of these risk factors are not exclusive to GBMSM [gay, bisexual, men who have sex with men] population and those people should probably be careful and look into monkeypox vaccine options, even if they don’t describe themselves as GBMSM,” he said.
“The more we can communicate that people will certainly pay attention to the behavioral descriptions, the better.”
As of Monday afternoon, all available monkeypox vaccine appointments are booked.
A spokesperson for the province says more information about future appointments will come soon.
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