The rant of a Spaniard has gone viral. He says he was infected with monkeypox while buying a scooter on a second-hand resale site.
The testimony of this Spaniard questions and the media across the Pyrenees were quick to echo his “thread” published this Saturday on Twitter as it goes against the main recommendations, in particular of the WHO. .
Mei Rito, who does not specify the region he is from, explains how he contracted, according to him, monkey pox. “Yesterday I was diagnosed with monkey pox. No, I haven’t been to any sex parties as the WHO says, and I haven’t gotten a tattoo either… You’ll freak out when you find out how did I get it.” Thus begins Mei Rito’s explanation.
Ayer me diagnósticaron viruela del mono. No, no he participated in ninguna fiesta sexual como dice la OMS, ni me he hecho un tatuaje… Vais a flipar cuando sepais cómo lo he looted #ViruelaDelMono ?ud83dudc47
—Mei Rito (@mei_rito) July 30, 2022
Once the diagnosis was made by his doctor, the young man sought to trace the behaviors that may have led to this transmission of a disease declared on high alert by the WHO last week.
The WHO which specifies that the contagion occurs by close contact with the infected skin, the bodily fluids or the respiratory droplets of an infected person with whom, in particular, sexual relations are maintained. For health authorities in all countries, the vast majority of infected people are men who have had sex with other men.
When buying a scooter?
But the story of Mei Rito goes against this belief which already generates a lot of stigmatization of the gay community. For him, no doubt, the only prolonged contact with another man, he had it… during a transaction for the purchase of a scooter.
Mei Rito bought a scooter from a popular second-hand website in Spain. “I greeted the seller then I tried the scooter for about fifteen minutes. It corresponded to my expectations, so I bought it and we said goodbye”.
15 minutes of contact with the handle of the scooter which could explain the transmission of the disease, the salesman having proved, thereafter, also reached him of the smallpox of the monkey.
The doctor of the young Spanish twitto confirmed that this mode of transmission could be quite credible, the seller having indicated that he had used the scooter when he already had wounds on his hands. Several doctors also shared Mei Rito’s story and called on their followers to be careful, as the transmissions could be more varied than initially announced.
“It’s not a gay disease as the WHO says,” Mei Rito then got carried away on Twitter, who wants to warn about these other transmissions of the disease. And to conclude his tweets with advice: “We will have to recycle these hydroalcoholic gels which can be essential to your health”.
Not a sexually transmitted disease
For several days, the WHO has been in the crosshairs of LGBT + associations around the world for having taken positions deemed stigmatizing on the transmission of this disease. But the account of the Spanish Twitto Mei Rito does not seem surprising. On its website, Public Health France indicates that “human-to-human transmission occurs during prolonged face-to-face contact by respiratory droplets or by direct contact with an infected person, through bodily fluids, skin lesions of the disease or internal mucous membranes such as the mouth, as well as indirectly by objects that the patient has contaminated, such as clothing or bed linen. It is therefore important that patients respect isolation for the entire duration of the disease (until disappearance of the last crusts, most often 3 weeks).”
It should be noted that Spain is the European country most affected by monkeypox since the first two deaths on the continent were recorded there this weekend.
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