OTTOVA – Canada’s chief public health official says the world needs to build better defenses against communicable diseases as climate change and other factors increase the risk of seeing more infectious diseases emerge in the coming years.
Dr. Teresa’s comments come as Canada has already confirmed 58 cases of monkeypox, including 52 in Quebec, five in Ontario and one in Alberta.
Worldwide, there are 550 confirmed cases in 30 non-endemic countries where the virus is not usually detected.
It warns that while we know a lot about how the monkeypox virus behaves in countries where it is endemic, we know little about how it can behave in populations that are mostly unvaccinated against it and do not have natural levels of immunity.
Monkeypox is caused by a virus and spreads when people come in direct contact with the virus, often through infectious wounds, scabs, body fluids or respiratory secretions during prolonged, intimate contact.
She says so far, cases in Canada have not spread beyond the specific community where the first cases were identified, but this is always a risk and public awareness is the key to identifying and tracking cases as quickly as possible.
This Canadian Press report was first published on June 3, 2022.
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