The repercussions of labeling HIV a homosexual disease led to 'untold suffering in gay communities in the 1980s who were blamed for the epidemic,' Boghuma K. People can also catch it through direct contact with bodily fluids or lesion material. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, monkeypox can infect people by entering the body through broken skin, the respiratory tract, or mucous membranes like the eyes, nose, or mouth. On Fox News, Jesse Waters called monkeypox a 'sexually transmitted disease' that is 'primarily passed through homosexual sex.'īut an expert on sexually transmitted diseases at WHO has emphasized that monkeypox is 'not a gay disease' and that anyone can contract it through close contact.Īccording to the U.S. That has led to some reporting that monkeypox can only be passed through sexual contact. AIDS Activists Demonstrate in Midtown for more research dollars, blaming President Reagan for lack of funding, New York, New York, 1988. Symptoms of one of the first known cases of the monkeypox virus are shown on a patient's hand.
