Urgent pleas for monkeypox vaccine as Bay Area cases rise, supplies dwindle
SAN FRANCISCO -- As the number of monkeypox cases in the Bay Area grows and as people wait for vaccines, calls are growing urgent for a more aggressive response to the outbreak.
A selfie of Marke Bieschke is not from April 2021 waiting in line for the COVID-19 shot, it's from Wednesday in Berkeley waiting for a dose of monkeypox vaccine.
"None of us expected to wait eight hours in line," Bieshcke told KPIX 5 via Zoom.
Demand for the monkeypox vaccine has far outstripped the supply. Also on Wednesday, San Francisco General Hospital, which had a line of patients seeking the vaccine snaking outside of it Tuesday, announced they were cutting off vaccinations, with only 50 doses.
For folks like Bieschke, the slow response of federal, state and local government to rise to the occasion in the face of a looming public health crisis again feels painfully familiar.
"Especially some of us who came through AIDS and the trauma of AIDS, having to share information in order to find out what medications were where - I think that this is reawakening some of that on top of some of the COVID trauma, the COVID experience of what are we doing and where are we getting what from," Bieschke said.
Dr. Peter Chin-Hong, an infectious disease specialist at UCSF, says there needs to be a push by the federal government to get more doses into arms right now.
"It's urgent because if we don't intervene right now - monkeypox may stay with us forever – which is what we call endemic. We have an opportunity right now to stamp it out," Chin-Hong told KPIX 5.
Among the reasons for urgency, the long incubation period of monkeypox, where a person can be infected, but symptom-free. Symptoms which can be squashed if vaccinations are given, even to the infected.
"You can get the vaccine, get those immune cells and immune cells start working immediately and you can actually prevent getting the disease, even if you take it after a week or so, you can reduce the severity of the disease," Chin-Hong explained.
For Bieshcke, he might have sore feet from standing in line for eight hours, but something else is pushing that feeling out.
"I wish everyone could experience this relief," he said.
Information on San Francisco's response to monkeypox, including vaccine locations, health guidance and current case counts, can be found at the San Francisco Department of Public Health website and the San Francisco City Government web page on monkeypox.
