The Chamberland filter. Penicillium rubrum. The Salk vaccine. At numerous times in human history, tremendous medical breakthrough have occurred that have completely re-oriented the way we view the world.
Well, brace yourself, folks, because it's happening again. Scientists have made a breakthrough that nobody, absolutely nobody — I mean not a single person in the entire world — saw coming:
Since the outset of the global monkeypox outbreak in May, public health and infectious disease experts have told the public that the virus is largely transmitting through skin-to-skin contact, in particular during sex between men.
Now, however, an expanding cadre of experts has come to believe that sex between men itself — both anal as well as oral intercourse — is likely the main driver of global monkeypox transmission. The skin contact that comes with sex, these experts say, is probably much less of a risk factor.
Whoa.
I am telling you, this completely upends everything we thought we knew about the ongoing monkeypox epidemic. We'll have to seriously reconsider every single thing we previously believed about how this virus spreads.
You will recall that experts have been really, really, really nervous to implicate the manic, fairly hedonistic sexual lifestyle practiced by many gay men as having anything to do with the spread of the virus.
But:
In recent weeks, a growing body of scientific evidence — including a trio of studies published in peer-reviewed journals, as well as reports from national, regional and global health authorities — has suggested that experts may have framed monkeypox's typical transmission route precisely backward.
Every virologist in the entire world right now:
It's so exciting to be alive in a time when science is discovering things absolutely nobody already knew!
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