Over the past weekend I went out on the street to do an informal survey of everyone I could find to ask them two questions: had they heard of Monkeypox?  And were they doing anything to protect themselves from Monkeypox?  The answers somewhat surprised me.

Every single person I spoke to had heard of Monkeypox.  I was expecting at least one or two to have not heard of it but literally everyone had.  So at least that’s good that some public health information had filtered through.

As for if they were doing anything to protect themselves, the overwhelming majority said no.  A few said they were using “masks and social distancing” which means either they were treating Monkeypox like COVID or they just gave a COVID-like answer to my question.  A few told me they weren’t doing anything to protect themselves because the disease is only circulating among men who have sex with men.  And a few said that they didn’t know what they should do to protect themselves or didn’t have time to learn what to do.  But again, the overwhelming majority of people said they weren’t doing *anything*.

It seems to me like Monkeypox just isn’t conjuring the same fear among the folks on the street that it is online.  It especially isn’t conjuring the COVID fear, I remember people almost running away from each other if they got too close in April 2020.  I’d like to hear from other people, if anyone else can share what if anything they are doing to protect themselves from Monkeypox.

Full Disclosure: this was my script for the survey.  Question 1: “Have you heard of Monkeypox?” Question 2: “Are you changing your behavior or doing anything differently to protect yourself from Monkeypox?”