Thread by @AaronKheriatyMD

1/ Monkeypox origin story. During the covid pandemic in May 2021, the Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI) and the Munich Security Council (MSC) convened an international pandemic war-game “Tabletop Exercise on Reducing High-Consequence Biological Threats.” nti.org/news/nti-bio-m…

2/ The scenario had participants imagine” a “global pandemic involving an unusual strain of Monkeypox,” a virus found in Africa, beginning one year later, on “May 15, 2022.”

3/ In typical pandemic war-game style, the biosecurity simulation script imagined catastrophic outcomes with over a quarter billion deaths worldwide from the genetically engineered monkeypox strain.

4/ Although the name sounds like it was written for a dystopian movie script, monkeypox is a real virus discovered in Africa in 1970; roughly 10% of cases are fatal.

5/ Then, in mid-May 2022, right on schedule, authorities in the real world reported outbreaks monkeypox in Europe, the U.K., the U.S., and Australia. The WHO convened an emergency meeting to address the outbreak a few days later.

6/ Fortune magazine reported on May 19 that “U.S. government places $119 million order for 13 million freeze-dried Monkeypox vaccines,” with an option to buy another $180 million, from biotech company Bavarian Nordic.
fortune.com/2022/05/19/mon…

7/7 Technically, these were smallpox vaccines which are reported to be 85% effective against monkeypox.