Dr. John Brooks, an internist at CDC office of prevention, speaks about #mpox. He notes that we've seen declines worldwide in new cases. 2/
Mpox likely transmitted most via contact with skin and the anorectal area. #CROI2023 3/
Dr. Brooks says, "We don't really know" why #mpox has declined so dramatically. He speculates vaccination and sexual behavior change in gay and bi men likely contributed. He does not mention my theory that the virus ran out of people with high frequency of new partners to infect.
Dr. Brooks calls for completion of the clinical trial of antiviral TPOXX , something that is difficult without many cases of #mpox occurring. He says people need to get vaccinated against mpox now before Pride season returns. #CROI2023
Dr. Brooks notes that presymptomatic transmission of #mpox is possible. #CROI2023
Dr. Sharon Frey, Clinical Director, Center for Vaccine Development, St. Louis University: MOLECULAR PATHOGENESIS AND THERAPEUTIC TARGETS FOR MPOX VIRUS lecture
Jynneos has been vaccinated intradermally:
Dr. Frey compares smallpox and #mpox at #CROI2023. "The presentation of mpox when it is sexually transmitted is very different from what we know of mpox in the past."
Dr. Frey reviews the history of smallpox vaccination. #CROI2023
Post-9/11, Iraq war era, Bush's administration was afraid that Iraq would use biological warfare. It turns out Iraq did not have smallpox on hand. Regardless, a program began to develop a new vaccine for smallpox. #CROI2023
The history of #mpox. #CROI2023
Dr. Frey says that quote about the virus disappearing because of ecological changes has the matter backward.
A play-by-play of the 2022 #mpox outbreak. Note that researchers later realized there had been signs of the virus in the UK by early April. #CROI2023
The CDC's John Brooks says that there are an est 2M Americans who would be good candidates for #mpox vaccination, because they are a man who has sex with men at risk of sexual acquisition and/or a person with HIV. 1.2M doses have been given; only 470,000 people have both doses.
A PhD student from @fredhutch says there has been "historical revisionism" going on in the talks in today's session. Yes, he says, there was decrease in sexual activity. "I think the LGBTQ community felt very let down by the public health infrastructure."
The @fredhutch student says, "We kind of had to take care of ourselves." He refers to the delay in the vaccine arriving on US shores. "I don't mean to tell you that this is bad or anything, but I don't necessarily think this is as rosy as being presented." (Applause)
"Now is the time to protect yourself. Prepare to be protected so you can take care of yourself in the future," said Dr. John Brooks of CDC at #CROI2023, anticipating that #mpox might rise again with the arrival of #LGBTQ Pride season. Will we see another mpox summer?
@MegDoherty_HIV of @WHO in Geneva says there's no guarantee that the public health emergency of international concern regarding #mpox will continue. She asks about the best way to continue monitoring and surveillance and not to lose momentum in combatting the virus. #CROI2023
Dr. John Brooks says, "We have the tools that work, how do we make sure we have equitable access to those around the world." The problem of #mpox, he says at #CROI2023, is growing in W and Central Africa.
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Nearly 40 percent of students at Brown University identify as something other than straight. The growth has been largely among students identifying as bisexual or as queer, pansexual, asexual or questioning. There has been little growth in gay identity.
Mother Jones is re-upping this article from January. The study in question found that, among minors with private health insurance, by age 17, about 1 in 1,000 were on cross-sex hormones during 2018 to 2023. The rate was higher than that for natal girls and was likely higher overall by 2023.
One way of reporting this news is to simply provide readers with the figures and let them decide whether they represent a little or a lot. open.substack.com/pub/benryan/p/…
Puberty blockers themselves, multiple studies have found, are not actually associated with any change in mental health metrics.
The Advocate reports: "Asked whether a parent concerned about their child facing a trans kid in girls’ sports 'has a case,' Pete Buttigieg @PeteButtigieg said, “Sure.” But he rejected blanket policies like the federal bans being enacted by the Trump administration, saying, “These decisions should be in the hands of sports leagues and school boards and not politicians, least of all politicians in Washington trying to use this as a political pawn.”
This statement has inspired a blistering response on Bleuskie—see the 🧵⬇️
Journalist Walter Bragman issues a blistering response to @PeteButtigieg’s statement over trans inclusion in sports, calling it “craven shit” and saying Mr. Buttigieg is catering to bigots.
“To just put a fine point on it: Parents do not, in fact, have legitimate concerns about trans kids playing sports,” Mr. Bragman says.
“Just because they believe bullshit doesn’t make it legitimate.
“Fuck anti-trans bigots.”
@PeteButtigieg A person called Guillotine Hunger Force argues that sports is not about winning.
Clara Jeffery, editor in chief of Mother Jones, says that it is for the best that JD Vance’s children be subjected to boos at Disneyland, so that they “know now what their father is about.”
Debunking podcaster Michael Hobbes also endorses the jeers at @JDVance’s family at Disneyland.
Clara Jeffery, editor in chief of Mother Jones, adds the following to her post endorsing the jeering of @JDVance while he is with his children at Disneyland. She argues that he actually wants the optics of being booed while having family time in public. bsky.app/profile/claraj…
Democrats Lost Voters on Transgender Rights. Winning Them Back Won’t Be Easy.
The party’s vanguard position got ahead of voters in 2024, and the internal debate now underway reveals an uncertainty on how to adapt, by @chashomans for @nytimes.
"Stuck in a widening gulf between the views of the party’s liberal voters and advocacy organizations on one side, and those of the broader American electorate on the other, many Democratic politicians had resolved to say as little as possible about the subject. In surveys, Ms. Erickson and other public-opinion researchers had found that this allowed Republicans, who spent hundreds of millions of dollars on ads attacking Democrats on transgender rights in 2024, to define voters’ perceptions of Democratic policy positions."
The dilemma is reflective of the Democratic Party’s broader struggles with identity politics as it dissects its losses in 2024. Recovering its standing with voters, many in the party believe, requires coming to terms with the party’s transformation during the Obama and first Trump presidencies, when American liberals broadly embraced what had previously been vanguard positions on a range of social and cultural issues, including gender and race, immigration and policing.
Dr. Rachel Levine, a former Biden administration health official, tells @TheAdvocateMag that "the evidence base is strong for the safety and efficacy" of prescribing puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones to treat gender dysphoria in minors.
A slew of systematic literature reviews have found this is not the case. Instead, they have found that the relevant evidence is weak and inconclusive. They have suggested that the World Professional Association for Transgender Health erred in making strong recommendations for these treatments. Evidence-based medicine guidelines discourage making a strong recommendation based on weak evidence.
Despite subpoenaed email records showing that Dr. Rachel Levine pushed WPATH to remove age limits on pediatric gender-transition treatments and surgeries for political reasons, Dr. Levine denied ever having done so in an interview with @TheAdvocate.
The New York Times reported last year: nytimes.com/2024/06/25/hea…
One excerpt from an unnamed member of the WPATH guideline development group recalled a conversation with Sarah Boateng, then serving as Admiral Levine’s chief of staff: “She is confident, based on the rhetoric she is hearing in D.C., and from what we have already seen, that these specific listings of ages, under 18, will result in devastating legislation for trans care. She wonders if the specific ages can be taken out.”
Another email stated that Admiral Levine “was very concerned that having ages (mainly for surgery) will affect access to care for trans youth and maybe adults, too. Apparently the situation in the U.S.A. is terrible and she and the Biden administration worried that having ages in the document will make matters worse. She asked us to remove them.”