Tubes labeled “Positive and negative monkeypox virus” can be seen in this illustration taken on May 23, 2022.
Dado Ruvic Reuters
A recent outbreak of monkeypox in the United States, Europe, Australia and the Middle East has puzzled health experts and raised concerns about a wider outbreak.
As of Wednesday, there were 346 confirmed and suspected cases in 22 countries outside Africa where the virus is endemic, according to Our World in Data.
This is the first known spread of the virus in the community. Previously, the outbreak was related to travel to regions where the virus is endemic or imported animals carrying the virus.
Most of the new cases have spread through sex, with a special concentration among men who have sex with other men. However, the World Health Organization has warned that anyone could be at risk of contracting the virus. Children, pregnant women and the immunocompromised are considered particularly at risk.
“Anyone who has close contact with someone who is infected is at risk,” the WHO website said in a statement on Wednesday.
Smallpox is a rare disease caused by the smallpox virus, part of the same family as smallpox, although usually less severe. Smallpox vaccinations have proven to be 85% effective against monkeypox.
The WHO said Monday that mass vaccinations are unlikely to be needed to fight the outbreak. But given the pace of the epidemic and the lack of clarity about its causes, public health called on people to practice good hygiene and safe sex to help control its spread.
Protect yourself from monkeypox
While health experts agree that the risks to the general public are low, there are a few precautions you can take to reduce your risk of contracting the virus.
Recommendations from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in the United States, the National Health Service of the United Kingdom and the WHO include:
- Avoid contact with people who have recently been diagnosed with the virus or who may have been infected.
- Wear a face mask if you are in close contact with someone who has symptoms.
- Use condoms and watch out for symptoms if you have recently changed sexual partners.
- Avoid contact with animals that may be carriers of the virus. This includes sick or dead animals and especially those with a history of infection, such as monkeys, rodents and prairie dogs.
- Practice good hand hygiene, especially after coming into contact with infected – or suspected infected – animals or people. For example, wash your hands with soap and water or use an alcohol-based hand sanitizer.
- Use personal protective equipment (PPE) when caring for patients with confirmed or suspected monkeypox infection.
This 2003 electron microscope image, provided by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, shows mature oval-shaped monkey virions, left and spherical immature virions, on the right, obtained from a human skin sample associated with the prairie epidemic. dog in 2003
Cynthia S. Goldsmith, Russell Regner CDC via AP
Monkeypox can also be transmitted through surfaces and materials, so it is wise to avoid contact with materials that have been in contact with a sick person or animal.
“It’s a virus that is super stable outside of the human host, so it can live on objects like blankets and things like that,” Dr. Scott Gottlieb said Monday.
“Regular washing of clothes and sheets at high temperatures would be a good practice,” Emanuel Andre, a professor of medicine at the University of Cu Leuven in Belgium, told CNBC on Wednesday.
However, he said he did not think it would be necessary for the general public to start avoiding public areas, taxis, shopping and hotels.
“The general population should not take much more precautions than we do in ordinary life,” he said. “If people are in a high-risk population where they are aware that they are in a high-risk environment, then they need to take extra precautions.
What to do if you catch monkeypox
If you suspect that you may have contracted monkeypox, you should isolate yourself from physical contact with other people and seek medical attention immediately.
Initial symptoms of smallpox include fever, headache, muscle aches, swelling, and back pain. After that, rashes and lesions usually appear on the face, arms, legs, eyes, mouth or genitals within one to five days. These rashes turn into bulging bumps and then into blisters that can fill with white fluid before breaking and striking.
In this chart of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the symptoms of one of the first known cases of the monkeypox virus were shown on the patient’s arm on May 27, 2003.
CDC | Getty Images
Many of the symptoms of the virus can easily be confused with other diseases, such as chickenpox, herpes or syphilis, so medical confirmation is important.
If you are diagnosed with monkeypox, you will need to isolate yourself until the virus passes. The disease is usually mild and most people recover within 2 to 4 weeks.
While medical advice currently varies from country to country, the UK National Health Service (NHS) notes that you may need to stay in a specialist hospital to prevent the infection from spreading to others.
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