OAKLAND (KCBS RADIO) – East Bay clinics will soon offer monkeypox vaccine doses by appointment only, with many LGBTQ residents fearing the disease's rapid spread.
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"A lot of people are just very concerned," Joe Hawkins, the Oakland LGBTQ Community Center's CEO and co-founder told KCBS Radio.
Hawkins said people have flooded the center with questions about monkeypox and requests for the vaccine, which Alameda County officials have finally started distributing.
The center's first vaccination clinic is scheduled for next Friday, July 29.
"We're really looking for the high-risk people who may know they were exposed to someone who did share with them that they have monkeypox," Hawkins said.
Alameda County officials on Thursday said that, of the 356 identified monkeypox cases in California, 35 are within the county. That total doesn't include the City of Berkeley, which said Tuesday it has identified six cases among city residents.
The vaccine's supply is still limited, and the clinic will offer shots by appointments only. Although San Francisco is considered the epicenter of the virus' spread in the region, Hawkins said it's vital the East Bay gets its share of shots, too.
"(We're) right across the bridge," Hawkins said. "So that really makes it more important that we also get the vaccine, and that it not just go to San Francisco. It has to come here to the East Bay, and throughout California."
Hawkins said monkeypox's early spread has served as a sad reminder of the HIV/AIDS crisis' early days. Although the virus is spreading predominantly among men who have sex with men, Hawkins said it would be a "mistake" for a person to think they can't contract the virus "because they don't identify as gay."
"You know, with AIDS it was like, 'It's a gay disease,' but then we really learned that anyone can get AIDS," Hawkins said. "Just like with monkeypox, anyone can get monkeypox."
The center will continue offering vaccination appointments until they run out of doses, Hawkins said.
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