Listening to communities: Lessons from the HIV/AIDS and monkeypox epidemics
November 9, 2022 • By Malika SharmaJust over 40 years ago, clinicians recognized a rare form of pneumonia in a handful of otherwise healthy young men in Los Angeles. This cluster would soon become known as the “start” of the HIV/AIDS epidemic. In 2022, clinicians in sexual health clinics in Montreal reported the first cases of monkeypox in Canada. In both instances, however, affected communities were the first to know that something was up. In the years before HIV was identified, people who inject drugs talked of “junkie pneumonia” or “the dwindles”. Later, these were identified as AIDS-related complications. Early in our current global monkeypox outbreak, members...