Joseph Cassara decided to head back to the emergency room when the pain made it unbearable to swallow.
"I tried to eat a banana for breakfast," he said, "and it just felt like I was swallowing razor blades."
Cassara, 33, was still waiting on the test results to confirm that he had monkeypox, but was suffering scorching fevers and gruesome lesions on his cheek and chin that felt as if they were on fire. The Fresno, California, resident was taking ibuprofen and Tylenol, but the agony persisted; at one point, he said, he woke at 2 a.m. with his fists and jaw clenched, drenched in sweat, and screamed at the ceiling in pain.
