I love science-fiction series like “The Man in the High Castle” because they force us to question our ingrained assumption that history was always ordained to turn out as it did. It was set in 1950’s America after the Allies lost World War II. Germany had beaten us to The…

Bird flu is on the move again. If it adapts to humans, we’re in big trouble. It has tried before, and failed. Viruses never give up, but their life’s not all a bed of noses either. — Last week, Zeynep Tufekci wrote a very scary column in The New York Times illustrated with a dead pelican and entitled “An Even Deadlier Pandemic Could Soon Be Here.” It described the widening spread of H5N1 avian influenza and warned that an outbreak among humans could be imminent. …

It’s down from its summer peak, but it’s creeping into new sexual networks — ones that will be harder to reach than leather bondage fetishists — The United States now has about 25 monkeypox cases per week, according to the C.D.C. — down from the early August peak of 450 a week. Journalists are declaring the outbreak all but over. …

For the third time in three years, a few ultra-Orthodox Jews who refuse to accept public-health norms have played a role in introducing a disease to New York City. Their rabbis should act before bigots do. — In 2019, measles spread from Ukraine to Israel to London to Brooklyn in networks of ultra-Orthodox families who refused to vaccinate their children. No one died, but more than 100 victims, most of them children, were hospitalized with pneumonia or with encephalitis, which can cause brain damage.

It will help fight the stigma and loneliness. It will make finding treatment easier. And it might slow the epidemic. — After a month’s delay, we have finally scrapped the fantasy that ring vaccination will work and are offering vaccine to all men at high risk of monkeypox. Even major media is slowly figuring out that we are in danger of blowing our monkeypox response. But we’re still behind the 8-ball.

Sorry to be a killjoy, but it’s not just sex that’s dangerous. Kissing or skin-on-skin contact can probably spread monkeypox. And even if you were one of the lucky few to get vaccine, you won’t be fully protected until August. — Happy New York Pride 2022. Some pro tips: Don’t have sex with men you don’t know, even with a condom. Don’t rub your bare skin against the bare skin of men you don’t know.

The WHO may soon declare a global emergency. Montreal has abandoned ring vaccination. In the U.S., we’re counting on ring-vaxing and ‘trust.’ Data and history suggest neither will work. — [Update: on June 23, New York City followed Montreal’s example and began offering Jynneos vaccine to gay men who have had multiple or anonymous sex partners in the last 14 days.] With over 2,600 cases in 47 countries, over 100 in the U.S. …

The story of one young man in Berlin shows that Germany is blowing it. We’re next. We should reschedule Pride celebrations — let this summer be lesbian-led — until we can vaccinate thousands of gay men. — Stuart is a young gay man in Berlin who got a monkeypox diagnosis this week. The pox on his rear end hurt too much to let him sit down, the two on his lips are “annoying and ugly,” and the ones in his genital tract feel like gonorrhea.

Despite official assurances that it’s containable, it’s growing fast. Its closest transmission analog may be herpes — which should worry heterosexuals too. — There are now almost 800 confirmed or suspected cases of monkeypox outside of Africa — up from a handful in early May. The W.H.O. just raised the threat level, saying it posed a “moderate risk” to global health. Technically, monkeypox already is a pandemic. It meets the definition the W.H.O…