Category: Monkey Pox

The World Health Organization declared the spread of mpox a global health emergency last week.

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Countries in Asia are closely monitoring for mpox cases after the World Health Organization recently declared an escalating outbreak in Africa as a global public health emergency.

Mpox, formerly known as monkeypox, is classified into two distinct groups: clade 1 and clade 2. It is transmissible through direct contact with an infected person, animal or contaminated items.

Clade 2 was responsible for the 2022 outbreak, which has led toaround 100,000 cases worldwide, NBC News reported, but now, a version of clade 1 has spread internationally, after starting in the Democratic Republic of Congo in January 2023.

In making the declaration, WHO Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said "it's clear that a coordinated international response is needed to stop these outbreaks and save lives."

On Thursday, Sweden reported the first known case of clade 1 outside Africa. Then on Monday, the Philippines reported its first case of mpox since December of last year, although it has not yet identified the strain.

Here's how the four largest economies in Asia have responded so far:

China's customs authorities announced they will strengthen surveillance at ports of entry.

People arriving from nations and areas with confirmed mpox cases and have been exposed to mpox with symptoms such as fever, headache, backpain or rashes must declare their condition to customs, the General Administration of Customs said.

Aircraft and vessels carrying containers, as well as cargo, arriving from nations and areas with mpox cases will also be sanitized, reported local news.

These measures went into effect Thursday, and will be enforced for the next six months.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has been continuously monitoring the mpox outbreak, the country's Ministry of Health and Family Welfare said in a statement.

The last case of mpox was detected in March, and as of Sunday, there are no reported cases in the country, according to officials.

In the past week, a meeting of health experts was held by India's National Center of Disease Control to assess the risk, officials said. And health teams at international airports have also been made aware of the situation.

Health authorities have also announced that they will enhance surveillance in an effort to promptly detect potential cases, as well as improve laboratory testing capabilities for early diagnosis, officials added, though they did not include any further details in the statement.

Health-care providers, such as hospitals and clinics, have also been tasked with increasing awareness of the virus.

Officials in Japan met on Friday to discuss potential actions and review strategies, local news reported, and agreed to gather data from countries where outbreaks have been confirmed.

Authorities plan to raise awareness of mpox and its spread among travelers entering and leaving the country, The Japan Times reported. It's unclear if the country will enforce any additional measures.

Meanwhile, the country's health minister, Keizo Takemi,recently said at a press conference that Tokyo is gearing up to send Japan-made vaccines made to the Congo, in response to a request, the outlet added.

The Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency has said that while the mpox situation remains "manageable" under existing measures, it will still bolster quarantine and surveillance efforts, according to local news.

The KDCA issued the remarks on Friday after holding a meeting with medical experts to discuss risk of an outbreak.

During the meeting officials decided to enforce quarantine measures for those on direct flights from countries with "epidemiological investigators and public health doctors deployed on-site," and decided not to reissue a crisis alert that was lifted May of last year, The Korea Times reported.

Korea is also planning to boost awareness campaigns to urge those with symptoms to go to a doctor immediately, it added.

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Mpox outbreak: Here's how Asian nations have reacted to WHO emergency declaration - CNBC

On 14 August 2024, the Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO) determined that the resurgence of Mpox in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and a growing number of countries in Africa constitutes a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC). Temporary recommendations are being developed with input from the International Health Regulations Emergency Committee and will be available in the coming days.

The emergence and rapid spread of a new virus strain in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, clade Ib, which appears to spread mainly through sexual networks, and its detection in neighboring countries of the Democratic Republic of the Congo are one of the main reasons for the declaration of PHEIC.

This Epidemiological Update provides a summary of the situation in the Americas based on cases reported to the Pan American Health Organization / World Health Organization (PAHO / WHO) and published on the official websites of the Ministries and Health Agencies of the Americas.

Read this article:

Epidemiological Update Mpox in the Americas Region - 17 August 2024 - Pan American Health Organization

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How do you test for monkeypox? What you need to know about mpox virus. - NorthJersey.com

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Mpox: what sexual health physicians need to know? - Nature.com

Theres been a lot of chatter about mpox online right now, so its understandable to have questions. As you might remember, mpox (formerly known as monkeypox) was a big concern in 2022 when it began spreading in the United States and other parts of the world. But that outbreak was contained with the help of the mpox vaccine, and the viral infection has since remained at low levels in the country.

While thats still the case, the

Given that its only been a few years since we lived through the COVID-19 pandemic, it makes sense to have concerns. Heres what you need to know, according to an infectious disease doctor.

Meet the expert: Thomas Russo, MD, professor and chief of infectious disease at the University at Buffalo in New York.

Mpox is a disease caused by the monkeypox virus. It causes similar symptoms to smallpox, but they tend to be less severe, per the WHO.

Mpox was practically unheard of in the United States before 2022, but the outbreak that happened in the country two years ago led to thousands of cases here. Since then, mpox has circulated in very low levels in the U.S. (around six to seven cases a day), according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

While mpox is pretty rare in the U.S., its more common in central and west Africa, per the WHO. Two clades (types) of mpox have emerged: clade I and clade II. Clade II is the type responsible for the 2022 outbreak, but it tends to cause less severe illness than clade I, which is the type behind the current outbreak in Africa.

As for why the WHO declared a global health emergency, its to limit the spread beyond Africa and help those currently infected on the continent.

The emergence of a new clade of mpox, its rapid spread in eastern DRC, and the reporting of cases in several neighboring countries are very worrying, said WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, PhD, in a statement. On top of outbreaks of other mpox clades in DRC and other countries in Africa, its clear that a coordinated international response is needed to stop these outbreaks and save lives.

Currently, this is "an opportunity to curtail the spread of this disease to continents outside of Africa," Thomas Russo, MD, professor and chief of infectious disease at the University at Buffalo in New York, tells Women's Health. As of now, theres just been one reported case in Sweden, and public health officials are hoping to keep it that way.

Certainly, if we pool our resources as a world to help countries that are overwhelmed with these cases, it will hopefully curtail the spread, Russo says.

Russo is not concerned with this turning into another COVID-19-style pandemic. Mpox is not as readily transmissible as agents capable of causing a pandemic, he says.

Mpox is usually transmitted through close contact, including skin-to-skin contact and sexual contact, he points out. In the U.S., those at high risk of mpox have been identified as men who have sex with men; some people in this group were already vaccinated against mpox during the 2022 outbreak, which can also help to limit the spread, Russo says.

Russo does not expect mpox to cause another lockdown. While there is some data to suggest that mpox can be airborne, its certainly not the main driver of spread, Russo says.

Overall, Russo recommends that people not panic over mpox just yet. The world is still suffering from post-traumatic COVID pandemic syndrome, he adds.

Korin Miller is a freelance writer specializing in general wellness, sexual health and relationships, and lifestyle trends, with work appearing in Mens Health, Womens Health, Self, Glamour, and more. She has a masters degree from American University, lives by the beach, and hopes to own a teacup pig and taco truck one day.

Originally posted here:

Doctors Say The Mpox 'Emergency' Is Different From COVID. Here's Why - Women's Health

As concerns mount about a type of mpox spreading across Africa thats believed to cause more serious illness, infectious disease experts expressed cautious optimism that this branch of the virus would not spread as broadly in the U.S. or cause health impacts as severe.

The risk of this subtype of mpox to the U.S. could be mitigated by a number of factors, including immunity from vaccination and previous infection from the outbreak of a different variant that began in 2022; the lack of viral circulation in wild animals; and better health care access, living standards and public health.

On Wednesday, the World Health Organization reinstated the status of mpox (formerly monkeypox) as a public health emergency of international concern. This was in response to a large ongoing outbreak of clade I of mpox a clade is an evolutionary branch in the Democratic Republic of Congo, or DRC, that has spread to other African nations.

Sweden announced the first clade I case outside of Africa on Thursday.

It was only a matter of time before we saw this extend beyond the African continent, Dr. Boghuma Titanji, an infectious disease specialist at Emory University, said.

In a statement issued Friday, Dr. Pamela Rendi-Wagner, director of the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control, said the agency had increased the risk level of clade I to the general European population from very low to low.

Due to the close links between Europe and Africa, Rendi-Wagner said, we must be prepared for more imported clade I cases.

The CDC confirmed on Friday that there have been no reported cases of clade I in the U.S. to date.

Clade I is generally considered more transmissible and more severe than clade II, which drove the global mpox outbreak that peaked in August 2022 and had a death rate of 0.2%. Immunocompromised people, in particular those with untreated, advanced HIV, have been at greatest risk of severe disease, hospitalization and death from clade II. The U.S. continues to see low-level clade II transmission.

Anne Rimoin, an epidemiologist at the University of California, Los Angeles, and a leading mpox expert, said context is key when considering how mpox might behave in Western nations compared with Africa.

I think we have to be very, very cautious about saying that this is more dangerous, Rimoin said of clade I. The data on the severity, associated mortality all of that is scant. There are a lot of questions about whether or not the perceived severity might have more to do with the population that its spreading in, their immune system, the route of transmission, the infectious dose.

The National Institutes of Health on Thursday reported that the antiviral TPOXX did not reduce clade I symptom duration in a DRC clinical trial. But promisingly, just 1.7% of the participants died, compared with a typical clade I death rate in DRC of 3.6% or higher. NIH experts touted the better medical care provided to study participants.

Epidemiologist Dr. Jennifer McQuiston, the lead for the Centers for Disease Control and Preventions mpox clade I response, said the study offered hope that high-quality health care in the U.S. would help minimize deaths from the disease.

Dr. Dan Barouch, a Harvard Medical School virologist, said it was likely the U.S. would see clade I cases. The absolute risk in the U.S. is currently low, he said. Although we need to remain vigilant.

CDC officials first alerted doctors and other health care providers in December to be on the lookout for clade I. The agency updated that advisory on Aug. 7. When U.S. clinics order testing of potential mpox samples from patients with suspected cases, some testing centers directly screen for mpox clade type, while others need to send samples to the CDC to do so. All positive results must be reported to the CDC. Numerous sites throughout the nation also survey wastewater for signs of the infection in the local population.

We are more worried about clade I than we are about clade II, McQuiston said of the CDCs sustained domestic vigilance.

The agency recently reported that receiving both doses of the Jynneos vaccine appears to reduce mpox risk. The CDC expects the vaccine to protect against both clades.

Throughout the now-low-level clade II outbreak, mpox has overwhelmingly spread through sex between men. The CDC continues to urge men with multiple male partners to receive both Jynneos doses. Only an estimated 1 in 4 of those considered at significant risk of mpox in the U.S. have been fully vaccinated.

The DRC outbreak has seen substantial sexual transmission of clade I among both gay men and female sex workers. Children, however, have accounted for two-thirds of the approximately 20,000 suspected cases and three-quarters of the 975 suspected deaths in the DRC since January 2023, according to the CDC.

Its possible that recent documented mutations in the virus may have made it more transmissible. Rimoin said close physical contact whether sexual or nonsexual household contact likely remains largely necessary for transmission.

People in the DRC tend to live in much more cramped quarters than in the U.S., Rimoin said.

We dont hear reports of people getting it at the market, McQuiston said.

McQuiston added: Household spread may be occurring in the DRC due to family members caring for the sick without the ability to protect themselves, and less ability to isolate those who are infected.

The vaccine remains woefully scarce in the DRC. In the U.S., where there is adequate supply, household contacts of infected people can seek the vaccine prophylactically.

People in rural DRC also likely contract mpox from an unknown wild animal host, perhaps a rodent. No animals in the U.S. are believed to carry the virus.

Differences in sexual behavior between gay men and heterosexuals in the U.S. might continue to limit mpoxs spread among the wider American population, Dr. Jeffrey Klausner, an infectious disease expert at the University of Southern California, said in an interview.

Unlike with heterosexuals, the overall population of gay and bisexual men has within it a smaller group that engages in behaviors that can sustain an mpox outbreak outside of Africa, Klausner wrote in a commentary in The Lancet Microbe on Aug. 7.

Klausner argued that infectious disease researchers have underestimated the rate of natural immunity from previous infection. For now, a combination of natural and vaccine-induced immunity, he argued, is sufficient among those engaging in sexual behavior patterns most likely to transmit mpox to largely prevent a substantial outbreak.

However, while research suggests that natural immunity from the 2022 outbreak has persisted, it may ultimately wane and mpox may mutate to evade such defenses.

Whats more, Dr. Chloe Orkin, an infectious disease expert at Queen Mary University of London, said, The extent to which immunity from clade II virus will protect people from infection or severe disease from clade I virus is unknown.

Emorys Titanji added another wrinkle, saying of clade I: I dont want people to get into a complacency and think that we cannot see this in a heterosexual network in the U.S.

Read more:

Could the new mpox threat cause significant harm in the U.S.? - NBC News

[Originally published: July 11, 2022. Updated: Aug. 14, 2024.]

Mpox (formerly known as monkeypox), an infectious disease typically found in parts of Central and Western Africa, has again been labeled a global health emergency by the World Health Organization (WHO).

Mpox became a global concern in 2022 when a type of the virus spread to other countries. That outbreak led to more than 90,000 cases worldwide, including more than 32,000 in the United States.

In 2023, the WHO declared an end to the global health emergency based on a decline in new cases and steady progress in controlling the spread of the disease, even though it continued to circulate in the community.

Now, public health officials around the world are concerned about a new strain of the virus that has driven up the number of cases and deaths in the Democratic Republic of Congo and other African countries. No cases have been reported in U.S.

Although it can affect anyone, most mpox cases from the 2022 outbreak were sexually transmitted and reported in men who have sex with men (MSM). The 2022 outbreak was caused by a strain called Clade IIb. The current outbreak is caused by Clade I, a strain that can also be sexually transmitted, cause more severe illness, and lead to death in up to 10% of those infected.

For reasons not yet known, the virus, since 2022, is behaving in ways never before seen, with cases occurring in countries that dont normally see it. Before this, mpox was also not known to spread easily among people or to infect large groups at once. Now, it can spread through close contact.

We talked with Marwan Azar, MD, a Yale Medicine infectious diseases specialist about what we know so far about this new strain of mpox.

Read more here:

Mpox: What You Need to Know - Yale Medicine

Since January 2023, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) has reportedmore than 22,000 suspect mpox cases and more than 1,200 deaths.

There are two types of mpox, clade I and clade II. Clade I usually causes a higher percentage of people with mpox to get severely sick or die compared to clade II.

Clade I mpox occurs regularly, or is endemic, in DRC. The current outbreak is more widespread than any previous DRC outbreak, and clade I mpox has spread to some neighboring countries, including Burundi, Central African Republic, Republic of the Congo, Rwanda, and Uganda. These countries are all reporting cases of clade I mpox, and some of them have links to DRC. On August 14, 2024, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared the outbreak a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC). This is the WHOs highest level of global alert, and the decision recognizes the potential threat this virus poses to countries around the world. The declaration focuses international attention on acute public health risks that require coordinated mobilization of extraordinary resources by the international community for prevention and response.

No cases of clade I mpox have been reported outside central and eastern Africa at this time, including the United States.

The risk to the general public in the United States from the type of mpox circulating in the DRC is very low.

CDC has made this assessment due to the limited number of travelers and no direct commercial flights from DRC or its neighboring countries to the United States. The risk might change as more information becomes available, or if cases appear outside central and eastern Africa.

People in the United States who have already had mpox or are fully vaccinated should be protected against the type of mpox spreading in DRC and neighboring countries. Mpox needs close or intimate contact to spread, so casual contact like you might have during travel is not likely to cause the disease to spread. The best protection against mpox is two doses of the JYNNEOS vaccine if youre eligible, People can also protect themselves by:

There are several outbreaks happening at the same time in DRC, with cases reported throughout the country, in the capital city of Kinshasa, and in some other large cities. In DRC, different provinces have outbreaks with different features. In some provinces, patients have acquired infection through contact with infected dead or live wild animals, household transmission, or patient care (transmitted when appropriate PPE wasnt used or available); a high proportion of cases have been reported in children younger than 15 years of age. In other provinces, the cases are associated with sexual contact among men who have sex with men and female sex workers and their contacts. These are first reported cases of sexual transmission with clade I mpox.

CDC has been supporting DRC mpox research and response for more than 20 years. CDC and other U.S. government agencies are on the ground in DRC helping partners in the country with disease surveillance, laboratory capacity including testing materials, strengthening workforce capacity, case investigation, case management, infection prevention and control, border health, and risk communication and community engagement. DRC has approved the use of vaccines in-country, so CDC is working with other U.S. government agencies and partners on a strategy for vaccination in DRC.

The Republic of the Congo (ROC), which borders DRC to the west, declared a clade I mpox outbreak in April 2024.There have also been confirmed clade I cases in Central African Republic (CAR), which borders DRC to the north.Clade I mpox is endemic to ROC and CAR, but the new cases appear to be linked to spread from DRC.In late July 2024, Burundi, Rwanda, and Uganda, which sit on the eastern border of DRC, reported confirmed cases of mpox.Clade I mpox has not been known to be endemic in these countries.Although contact tracing is ongoing, some cases have links to DRC.Rwanda and Uganda have confirmed these cases are clade I MPXV. In Burundi, clade-specific testing is underway, but cases are presumed to be clade I because of DRC and Rwandas shared borders with Burundi. Person-to-person transmission has occurred during this outbreak, including through sexual contact, household contact, and within the healthcare setting. People have also gotten mpox through contact with infected wild animals.

CDC is working with Ministries of Health and in-country partners across the region on disease surveillance, laboratory capacity including testing materials, strengthening workforce capacity, case investigation, case management, infection prevention and control, border health, and risk communication and community engagement.

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2023 Outbreak in Democratic Republic of the Congo | Mpox | Poxvirus - CDC

The World Health Organizations decision to declare mpox a global public health emergency for the second time in two years may seem like dj vu but there are key differences between the strain thats causing international concern now and the one that spread in 2022.

Mpox, formerly known as monkeypox, is a viral infection characterized by painful lesions. Its spread by direct contact with an infected person, animal or contaminated items like clothing or bedding.

The virus is classified into two distinct groups: clade I and clade II.

Clade II was responsible for the 2022 outbreak, which has led to around 100,000 cases worldwide.

But now, a version of clade I has spread internationally. The outbreak started in January 2023 in the Democratic Republic of Congo, and has since reached 12 other countries in the region.

On Thursday, Sweden confirmed the first known infection of clade I outside Africa, though Swedish health officials said the person was infected while spending time in Africa. Health authorities in Pakistan also confirmed a case of mpox on Friday but have not identified the strain yet.

Clade I is more transmissible than clade II and capable of being more severe, so infectious disease experts are concerned about further international spread.

We should have learned a lesson from 2022 that an infection anywhere is potentially an infection everywhere, said Anne Rimoin, an epidemiology professor at the University of California, Los Angeles Fielding School of Public Health.

Mpox has historically spread in a few ways. The first is through close, personal contact with an infected person, such as skin-to-skin contact with rashes or with saliva or mucus. The second is via contact with contaminated materials. And the third is contact with infected animals: hunting, trapping or cooking them, touching sick rodents or getting bitten or scratched.

In 2022, the version of clade II that spread globally, dubbed clade IIb, was passed primarily through sexual contact, particularly among men who have sex with men.

In the Democratic Republic of Congo recently, clade Ib has also been spreading through sexual contact among female sex workers and men who have sex with men. Research that hasnt yet been published or peer reviewed linked an outbreak in an eastern mining town in Congo to professional sex work in bars.

But thats not the only way the virus is being transmitted. Dr. Stuart Isaacs, an associate professor of medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, said much of the spread of clade I could be due to exposure to animals and transmission within households, but limited surveillance in the regions where the virus is make it difficult to know for sure.

Isaacs said theres early evidence that clade Ib has certain properties that are allowing it to spread more readily person to person.

In the past, outbreaks of clade I have been deadlier than clade 2, killing up to 10% of people who got sick. But more recent outbreaks have had lower death rates. Out of an estimated 22,000 cases in this outbreak in Congo, more than 1,200 people have died which puts the fatality rate at just above 5%.

By comparison, clade II outbreaks in Africa have generally had a mortality rate of around 1%, and just 0.2% of cases linked to the 2022 global outbreak were fatal.

Rimoin said the diseases severity can have less to do with the actual clade and more to do with route of transmission, the immune system of the individual, the source of the infection.

The threat in the U.S. could be milder than in Africa, according to Marc Siegel, an associate professor of medicine at the George Washington School of Medicine and Health Sciences.

The underlying health conditions of the population in the DRC are probably contributing to the current case fatality rate, he said, using the acronym for the Democratic Republic of Congo. With less malnutrition and better access to health care resources, I would imagine that the case fatality rate will not be as high as were seeing in the DRC.

Vaccines for mpox are also widely available in the U.S., following a major rollout effort in 2022. Two doses of the mpox vaccine or a previous clade II infection should protect against severe illness from clade I, the Department of Health and Human Service said Wednesday.

Symptoms of the two mpox clades can be difficult to distinguish from each other.

The illness generally starts with a rash that progresses to small bumps on the skin, followed by blisters that fill with whitish fluid a hallmark of the disease and eventually scab over. People may also experience a fever, headache, muscle aches, back pain, low energy and swollen lymph nodes.

These symptoms often disappear on their own within a few weeks. But in severe cases, people may develop larger, more widespread lesions, secondary bacterial infections, pneumonia, heart inflammation or swelling of the brain. Immunocompromised people may develop atypical symptoms and have a greater risk of hospitalization and death.

Historically, mpox lesions have tended to appear on the face, chest, palms of the hands and the soles of the feet. But during the 2022 outbreak, people frequently developed lesions around the genital and anal region or inside the mouth and throat, presumably because of how the virus was spreading at the time. The lesions were also fewer in number and less pronounced overall.

Some cases of this nature have also been detected in the current outbreak in Congo.

There is talk that there are more people that have lesions around the genitals this time around than previous clade I outbreaks, said Amira Albert Roess, a professor of global health and epidemiology at George Mason University. Its going to take us some time to really understand what may be going on here.

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Mpox outbreak: What to know about the virus' symptoms, severity as it spreads - NBC News

The announcement that a new version of mpox had been discovered in Sweden this week was the first indication that the disease had slipped out of Africa, where it has caused an escalating crisis in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

The announcement on Thursday about the disease formerly known as monkeypox came just a day after the World Health Organization declared a global health emergency, and it confirmed fears that a further spread was inevitable.

The person with the disease in Sweden had traveled to an area affected by the disease.

The European Center for Disease Prevention and Control said it was highly likely that more imported cases would be confirmed, in large part because of frequent travel between Europe and Africa. The center advised member countries to increase preparedness and to issue travel advisories recommending that people traveling to affected areas see if they are eligible for vaccination.

Pamela Rendi-Wagner, the E.C.D.C. director, warned that as long as the outbreak in Africa was not under control, cases would continue to appear in Europe and North America too.

We have to be concerned, even outside Africa, because with the increasing number and the fast spread, the likelihood of the introduction of cases in Europe and the U.S. will increase, Dr. Rendi-Wagner said in an interview on Friday.

The E.C.D.C. on Friday raised the risk of people in the European Union contracting the new version from very low to low, but emphasized that people traveling to and from the affected areas in Africa need to take precautions and are at a high risk.

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Mpox Case in Sweden Sets Off Concerns of Wider Spread in Europe - The New York Times