Aug 5, 2022·edited Aug 5, 2022Liked by John Skylar, PhD
I am immensely gratified to read a thought I expressed in the comments here in your essay: that the best defense for the acro community is just that: being and acting like a community.
Question for when you get back to monkeypox: what are the odds someone will develop an OTC test?
Flowhealth HQ has a mailorder of their saliva test, for I think $125 or $150 cash only. Dunno if they'll start doing insurance or whether they'll start selling it for keep at home, with add'l charge to process.
John, thank you for addressing shared mats and such!
Carl - I do agree that acro being a community of people who generally know each other and are already trusting one another for safety is powerful, but there's also just the matter of figuring out exactly what to say. I'm mostly settled on "here's the symptoms; just like C19 stay away if you're sick, but now additionally please make sure to cover any 'it's probably fine,' and if it's on palms or soles of feet just no."
I think i might also try to encourage towels with an obvious up side; the current culture simply doesn't seem to think of surfaces unless it's a yoga studio with mats that come out for classes.
(Acroyoga is not really like yoga in terms of 'brief time on any given part of mat' - L basing someone is laying on the mat for a while and manipulating someone else in the air, on top of feet and hands, supporting shoulders and sometimes bare parts of legs)
I mean, >$100 is obviously an unacceptable price for it. I think the same principles apply for what home monkeypox testing needs to be as applied to COVID-19--cheap, easy, ubiquitous.
I do think we will eventually see a home testing solution available OTC, but I'm also unsure how soon. The FDA has allowed a lot of the COVID home tests under EUAs, but I'm not sure what their appetite is to do the same for monkeypox. If such a test is developed, I think they should allow it to follow that pathway, but I don't work there.
the flowhealth test is mail order PCR, so more like Pixel By Labcorp.
This Week in Virology Daniel Griffin Clinical update had an aside about home antigen tests down the line. The First Kiss TWiV spent some time discussing MPX and especially on rubbing ("vigorous touching"); they were in agreement wrestling would be a spread place. I agree with them, too, that CDC including "scientists are still researching whether [asymptomatic, etc]" is a major improvement.
Yep, I remember that discussion from the episode. Recently I gave a presentation to a group of people explaining that just because monkeypox seems to be spreading in situations where there is sex, doesn't mean necessarily that it can't spread elsewhere. One point that I made is that unlike HIV, which appears to require penetrative sex, MPXV spread doesn't seem to rely on this. I could imagine a circumstance where someone thinks, mistakenly, that their particular form of contact with others is not a risky behavior, but it turns out that there is the possibility for transmission on some object or other item used during the activity. That's written broadly on purpose. It applies as much to sex toys as it does to full-contact sports.
Could you do a something on the various polio vaccines, specifically the Salk, & the level of protection adults & seniors in NYC might have.
I am unable to find anything re: the # of doses for Salk but, having had it & asking a friend, very unlikely to have been 4. One, maybe 2 seems more likely.
Searches revealed Salk had lowest efficacy vs. Type 1, the most common Type, at least at the time, and that it wanes.
“The Salk vaccine was declared 90% effective against Types II and III poliovirus and 60 to 70% effective against Type I.”
FYI, NYC DOH just published a polio vax under age 5 Zip Code map. Much is what you’d expect, some is shocking (Battery Park City is one of the 5 lowest???). It is a PDF and, as of last night, not on their site. If you Google, it comes up.
And many thanks for the extensive & nuanced laundry response. I sent it to friends who found it very informative.
I am immensely gratified to read a thought I expressed in the comments here in your essay: that the best defense for the acro community is just that: being and acting like a community.
Question for when you get back to monkeypox: what are the odds someone will develop an OTC test?
Flowhealth HQ has a mailorder of their saliva test, for I think $125 or $150 cash only. Dunno if they'll start doing insurance or whether they'll start selling it for keep at home, with add'l charge to process.
John, thank you for addressing shared mats and such!
Carl - I do agree that acro being a community of people who generally know each other and are already trusting one another for safety is powerful, but there's also just the matter of figuring out exactly what to say. I'm mostly settled on "here's the symptoms; just like C19 stay away if you're sick, but now additionally please make sure to cover any 'it's probably fine,' and if it's on palms or soles of feet just no."
I think i might also try to encourage towels with an obvious up side; the current culture simply doesn't seem to think of surfaces unless it's a yoga studio with mats that come out for classes.
(Acroyoga is not really like yoga in terms of 'brief time on any given part of mat' - L basing someone is laying on the mat for a while and manipulating someone else in the air, on top of feet and hands, supporting shoulders and sometimes bare parts of legs)
I mean, >$100 is obviously an unacceptable price for it. I think the same principles apply for what home monkeypox testing needs to be as applied to COVID-19--cheap, easy, ubiquitous.
I do think we will eventually see a home testing solution available OTC, but I'm also unsure how soon. The FDA has allowed a lot of the COVID home tests under EUAs, but I'm not sure what their appetite is to do the same for monkeypox. If such a test is developed, I think they should allow it to follow that pathway, but I don't work there.
the flowhealth test is mail order PCR, so more like Pixel By Labcorp.
This Week in Virology Daniel Griffin Clinical update had an aside about home antigen tests down the line. The First Kiss TWiV spent some time discussing MPX and especially on rubbing ("vigorous touching"); they were in agreement wrestling would be a spread place. I agree with them, too, that CDC including "scientists are still researching whether [asymptomatic, etc]" is a major improvement.
Yep, I remember that discussion from the episode. Recently I gave a presentation to a group of people explaining that just because monkeypox seems to be spreading in situations where there is sex, doesn't mean necessarily that it can't spread elsewhere. One point that I made is that unlike HIV, which appears to require penetrative sex, MPXV spread doesn't seem to rely on this. I could imagine a circumstance where someone thinks, mistakenly, that their particular form of contact with others is not a risky behavior, but it turns out that there is the possibility for transmission on some object or other item used during the activity. That's written broadly on purpose. It applies as much to sex toys as it does to full-contact sports.
Could you do a something on the various polio vaccines, specifically the Salk, & the level of protection adults & seniors in NYC might have.
I am unable to find anything re: the # of doses for Salk but, having had it & asking a friend, very unlikely to have been 4. One, maybe 2 seems more likely.
Searches revealed Salk had lowest efficacy vs. Type 1, the most common Type, at least at the time, and that it wanes.
“The Salk vaccine was declared 90% effective against Types II and III poliovirus and 60 to 70% effective against Type I.”
https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.288.5471.1593
“Some disadvantages of the Salk vaccine in that time were the decrease of the titres of the circulating antibody within a few years of vaccination”
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3782271/
FYI, NYC DOH just published a polio vax under age 5 Zip Code map. Much is what you’d expect, some is shocking (Battery Park City is one of the 5 lowest???). It is a PDF and, as of last night, not on their site. If you Google, it comes up.
And many thanks for the extensive & nuanced laundry response. I sent it to friends who found it very informative.
I got a TDaP booster in 2020. I hope other public-health-aware people do the same.
Presumably you mean you got a Tdap-IPV shot, because the normal Tdap products (ADACEL and BOOSTRIX being most common) do not contain polio antigens.
Honestly? I misremembered what the P in TDaP stood for.
Ah. Well, rest assured I plan to comment on the polio situation to the extent possible in a coming issue, so hopefully that will help here.