Monkeypox: the psychological stigma that this disease leaves

Although monkeypox mainly causes skin lesions and fever, people who have had it suffer psychological consequences associated with the disease, according to several patients and doctors.

“From an illness that has done you great damage, you will not come out safe and sound, locked up for three weeks and, moreover, with a heaviness discrimination”, says 27-year-old Corentin Hennebert, who was one of the “first cases” in France. Since he recovered, other patients have also told him about the “psychological cost” of the disease.

“There is psychological stress that comes from several things,” explains Nathan Peiffer-Smadja, an infection specialist at the Bichat Hospital in Paris, who is coordinating a clinical study of infected patients.

On the one hand, “pain” and possible “consequences, especially aesthetic”, and on the other hand, the fact of suffering from “a disease that people have never heard of”, which came two years after COVID-19 pandemicand this requires a three-week isolation.

A small number of patients develop internal traumaespecially coloproctological (which affect the colon, rectum, and anus) and which sometimes require hospitalization, he explains.

This was the case with Hennebert: “I had the impression that razor blades were pricking me all the time. I can’t find any other comparison, it was so powerful,” he recalls.

Before tramadol treatment powerful pain reliever on opioids, he “lost 7 kg in three days” as he stopped eating. “I only thought about the pain,” he says.

Sebastian Tuller, a 32-year-old Frenchman, did not have these pains, but he was very worried about his appearance injury. “It was really ugly and I didn’t know what to do. I was very distressed to see (the pustules) on my face.”

HIV trauma

“When disease it’s visible, it’s frightening because it has the potential to cause stigma,” says Michel Ohayon, director of 190, a sexual health center in Paris, who likens it to “Kaposi’s sarcoma,” which was “a symptom of AIDS.”

Parallelism that affected people usually do.

Although two disease “They have nothing in common” in terms of severity, monkeypox “renews the traumas of HIV,” according to Nicolas Derche, national director of the health services of the French SOS group, which brings together 650 social and medico-social structures.

“In HIV-positive people, it reactivates very violent things,” whether it be “fear of a diagnosis” or “a resurgence of strong stigma,” explains Vincent Leclerc, an AIDS activist with the NGO Helpers.

As with HIV, monkeypox is now circulating among MSM (men who have sex with men), which has led to increased discrimination.

“There is a lot of widespread homophobia and it has a real impact on mental health” explains Sebastian Tuller, an LGBT activist and lawyer.

‘Many don’t say they have ‘monkeypox’ or that they had it for fear of being branded”, he points out.

“Especially young people who have not yet come out to their family, or people who are afraid that their sexual orientation due to the required three-week isolation.

AFP