Tucker Carlson Called ‘Homophobic’ For Pushing To Rename Monkeypox As 'Schlong Covid'

Fox News host Tucker Carlson is facing backlash from viewers for suggesting monkeypox be renamed "Schlong Covid" during his nightly show.

The 53-year-old made the comment while announcing the results of a Twitter poll conducted Thursday evening, during a segment on "Tucker Carlson Tonight."

"So, monkeypox is about the coolest name ever for a disease," he said, adding, "But, they are changing the name because racism or something." Carlson was referring to New York City calling upon the World Health Organization (WHO) to change the name, which had racist undertones.

"So we had a vote. Without ballot harvesting. You can trust our counting and the new name for monkeypox is now officially -- and we are declaring it -- schlong Covid. That won our audience election result with about 40 percent of the vote," he said.

Carlson then urged viewers to call up Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) director Rochelle Walensky to let her know about the name change.

The CDC had reportedly spent $16k on her media training to improve her public messaging focused on COVID-19.

Carlson's Twitter poll listed the following options as alternate names for monkeypox -- Hunter Hives, Midterm Variant, Adam Schiffilis, and Schlong Covid. The latter received 39.3% of the 26,253 votes cast at the time of this writing.

"Schlong Covid" appears to be a reference to the fact that 90% of monkeypox patients are men, and at least 95% are men who have male sexual partners.

WHO head Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has advised gay and bisexual men to limit their sexual partners to lower the risk of infection and curb the spread while asking that the public health officials, government, and the media join hands to fight the stigma and discrimination surrounding the disease which might deter patients from seeking treatment, which in turn will fuel the outbreak further.

Carlson's video clip of him making the renaming suggestion has been virally shared on Twitter with explosive opinions from the general public.

"Tucker Carlson manages to mock people with Long Covid and be homophobic at the same time. Stochastic terrorism," read a tweet.

"Schlong Covid is just what I call Tucker Carlson," wrote another.

"Tucker Carlson now calls monkeypox 'Schlong Covid'. Letting his viewers believe it’s an STD (it’s not) that afflicts only men who have sex with men does a disservice to public health that will only make it more difficult to contain this virus which has already spread to children," a third wrote.