The biggest problem I see with discussion about monkeypox this summer is the almost omnipresent message that "we need to do something before it breaks out into the general population."

I don't think people saying things like that are being intentionally malicious, but from the perspective of a gay person, that's pretty cold.

How about we fight monkeypox because it's making people ill right now?

Gay people in Los Angeles, New York, London, Amsterdam, and other major metropolitan areas are dealing with an epidemic today.

In the United States, gay people are trying to get vaccinated and can't because the US government neglected to contract for a vaccine supply in the early days of the epidemic.

Public health authorities in the United States have been wringing their hands over messaging, worrying about stigmatizing gay people.

Gay people, including at editorial meetings of the Los Angeles Blade that I've attended, are like "Fuck that. Get the word out and get the vaccine distributed."

Stigmatization is going to happen, regardless of the best-intentioned messaging, if monkeypox continues to spread within gay communities.

Messaging isn't the problem. Lack of vaccine and lack of effective vaccine distribution plans are the problem.

And as many LGBTQ leaders have been pointing out for weeks, the public health response in the U.S. had been bumbling and worse.

How were we not ready to tackle this? Why did it take so long to gear up? Why did public health authorities not seem to take monkeypox seriously until they believed it might break out beyond gay communities?

Are gay people not Americans also, deserving of the full public health protection of our government?