During a time when monkeypox, COVID, polio, West Nile and E. coli outbreaks are happening, now is not the time to play about your health. Unfortunately, a Los Angeles man who appears to have monkeypox is facing massive backlash after he posted a video of himself going to McDonald’s with extremely noticeable lesions covering his face, arms and hands.
The man who identifies himself as Duane Cali on TikTok sits in a car as he takes a sip from his drink and speaks to the camera. “What’s good, y’all? My bad I’m not in the house. But I had to go make a McDonald’s run ‘cause I ain’t got no groceries. I ain’t have no food,” he says in the video. He adds, “I just wanted to make this video to remind you to be careful who you f**k with. Because not everybody who you f**k with is gonna f***k with you. Not everybody you look out for is gonna look out for you. S**t, you might show up for the wrong motherf**ker at the wrong place, at the wrong time, and end up with the f**kin’ monkeypox.”
Many users were outraged, wondering how he paid for his food since the contagious virus can be spread by touching shared surfaces, such as cards or cash, that an infected person has touched. Users flooded his TikTok comment section with messages like, “Why did you go out to get food? What about the person that took your payment, etc?” Another wrote, “Use a delivery service and do the no contact option. Have a friend leave it at your door. Come on.” Others blamed him and people with his mindset for the shortage of public service workers throughout the years-long pandemic: “This right here is why no one wants to work with the public anymore.”
Some speculated that the TikToker exposed others to monkeypox for “clout.” As the video ends, he says, “At the end of the day, just choose yourself.” A song titled “Choose Yourself” by Duane Cali plays and an announcement saying the single is available “on all platforms” appears. A person on Twitter commented, “It’s for clout to push [an] underperforming music career. It’s also reckless and irresponsible.”