A proud gay actor has become the first American monkeypox victim to go public, writing about his terrifying experience with the virus that causes painful lesions all over the body.
Matt Ford slammed health officials for a ‘lackluster’ job of testing for the virus, which has left many cases undiagnosed. He also shared that he got infected through skin-to-skin contact with a friend in L.A.
Here’s what Matt wrote an article for Buzzfeed, where he used to work:
“On Friday, June 17, that quickly changed. I received a call from a friend in LA who informed me that he had tested positive for monkeypox and that I might have been exposed the weekend prior via skin-to-skin contact. Sure enough, I checked myself for spots and noticed a couple of lesions in the underwear zone.”
In a series of tweets, Matt, an openly gay actor who splits his time between Los Angeles and New York City, said the disease “sucks” as he is unable to “sleep through the night”. He also blasted the US government for its slow response to the virus that has infected more than 142 people in the country.
“The government needs to pick up the pace on vaccines and testing. The slow response is pretty unacceptable,” Ford said.
Here’s what Matt said in a video he posted on Twitter blaming CDC for its slow response to the virus:
“As of now, it seems to be primarily affecting queer men, but it can easily spread to anyone. And according to my doctor… the CDC is doing a really lackluster job of tracking how many cases there actually are due to lack of testing and just generally not being on top of it.”
“I think in total I counted more than 25 and there are also some in more sensitive areas, which also tend to be the most painful, as in, it was so painful I had to go to my doctor and get painkillers just to be able to go to sleep. Really f*cking painful,” he said.
The gay actor also said that he is having flu-like symptoms, such as a high temperature, cough, chills, and night sweats. And at the end of the video, Matt urged everyone to get the vaccine if they can.
“In addition to the spots, even before those, there are intense flu-like symptoms. I had a sore throat, cough, fever, [and] chills. I was sweating through my sheets at night. Just overall, really miserable, swollen left nodes. Not good,” he stated.
“I’m advocating telling everyone if you can get that vaccine, go get it. In the meantime, I’m urging you to please be careful, be safe, be cautious of prolonged skin that’s getting caught with someone who might have it, not to add to any stigma whatsoever,” he concluded.
You can watch the video below:
Monkeypox PSAhttps://t.co/yWfVLk8rwz pic.twitter.com/GCCPZoQ5cw
— Matt Ford (@JMatthiasFord) June 27, 2022
The virus was first discovered in 1958 among research monkeys but spread to humans in the early 1970s. While extremely rare and not easily transmitted, the ongoing outbreak has been traced to gay sexual activity at two recent raves in Europe, according to the World Health Organization.
As of now, there are 306 confirmed cases that have been found throughout 27 states and D.C. Health authorities from the White House and the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) revealed a new vaccination approach to combat the increasing Monkeypox outbreak in the United States on Tuesday night.
Here’s what HHS said in a statement:
“HHS will provide 296,000 doses of JYNNEOS vaccine. Of that amount, 56,000 doses will be made available immediately, and an additional 240,000 doses will be made available in the coming weeks. HHS expects more than 750,000 additional JYNNEOS doses to be made available over the summer, and an additional 500,000 doses will undergo completion, inspection, and release throughout the fall, totaling 1.6 million doses available this year.”
Sources: TheGatewayPundit, Buzzfeed
