It is simple enough to say that monkeypox is spreading especially among men who have sex with men. If you also say that there is elevated risk for trans and nonbinary people who have sex with men, you’ve covered the whole universe of elevated sexual risk for monkeypox in a clear and understandable way. Instead, Menza starts by talking about, for some reason, “people assigned male at birth who have sex with men and people assigned female at birth” — that is, to a first approximation, gay men plus women, which is not anywhere close to an accurate description of the high-risk group.

It is unacceptable, if you have Dr. Menza’s job, to speak in woke word salads like this. Menza is speaking on a broadcast news program. It is his job to communicate in clear terms to the broad public. And few members of the public describe themselves as “assigned male at birth” or even think of their sex as something that was “assigned.” This is woke jargon, and it’s unsuitable for a news interview.