MONKEYPOX. Monkey pox cases are increasing in France. While the virus is spreading in several countries around the world, the Haute Autorité de Santé has unveiled its vaccine strategy.
The essential
- Monkeypox – also “Monkeypox” – is spreading and worrying. It is the subject of particular attention by the WHO: to date, more than 100 cases of contamination have been identified in nearly 20 countries around the world. In Portugal (37 cases), Spain (34) and the United Kingdom (57) in particular, the virus is circulating more and more. The WHO has warned that the virus will spread more actively.
- Five first cases of monkey pox have been identified in France. On May 24, the health agency indicates that these contaminations are linked to “men who have sex with men” but “without direct links with people returning from endemic areas”, namely Central and South Africa. ‘west.
- On May 24, the French High Authority for Health unveils its vaccine strategy to fight against the spread of the virus in a press release. This vaccination will concern confirmed cases, that is to say adults whose contact with an infected person is considered to be at risk;
- Monkeypox is often mild, but it can cause serious symptoms, especially in humans. It is potentially fatal in very rare and very serious cases. No vaccine exists.
- Public Health France looked at the monkeypox virus and gave some insight: “Monkeypox is a disease that is transmitted from animals to humans. Cases are often observed near tropical rainforests where carrier animals are found. of the virus”, indicates SPF, which adds: “Transmission takes place by direct contact with blood, body fluids or lesions of the skin or mucous membranes of infected animals, for example by a bite or a scratch”. A clarification must be added on contamination: “Human-to-human transmission occurs during prolonged face-to-face contact by respiratory droplets or by direct contact with an infected person, through bodily fluids, skin lesions of the disease or the internal mucous membranes such as the mouth, as well as by objects that the patient has contaminated, such as clothing or bed linen”.
- Transmission is seen “mainly in individuals who identify as gay or bisexual or in men who have sex with men,” the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) told the BBC on Sunday.
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09:24 – Cases are increasing in Europe
The circulation of monkeypox is accelerating. On May 24, new countries are added to the list. In eastern Europe, three countries have recorded their first case of the virus. The Czech Republic, Austria and Slovenia have announced the presence of a confirmed case on their territory. In recent days, the presence of this rare virus, endemic in certain regions of Africa, has been reported in several European countries, including Great Britain, France or Spain, as well as in the United States.
05/24/22 – 23:58 – How is the virus transmitted?
[Fin du direct] The virus can be transmitted by direct or indirect contact. It is possible to catch it with lesions on the skin or mucous membranes of a sick person, as well as through droplets (saliva, sneezing, sputters, etc.), but also through contact with sheets and clothing used by a confirmed case.
05/24/22 – 23:11 – How effective is vaccination on monkeypox?
If the vaccine against human smallpox can be used for monkeypox, it is only as a preventive measure, as specified by the WHO: “It has been shown through several studies that vaccination against smallpox is 85% effective in preventing monkeypox”. During the last wave of smallpox, in the 1970s, a long vaccination campaign (spread over ten years) eradicated the virus. European countries such as Spain have announced that they have ordered thousands of doses.
05/24/22 – 22:41 – Why does the WHO want to be reassuring in the face of the virus?
While cases of monkeypox have been detected in twelve countries, the European authorities wanted to be reassuring. According to an official from the World Health Organization, transmission between humans can be stopped in non-endemic countries. Maria Van Kerkhove, who is in charge of emerging diseases and zoonoses at the WHO, even added that the situation could be controlled, “particularly in the countries where we see this epidemic occurring in Europe”.
05/24/22 – 10:16 p.m. – Who are the people at risk of mokeypox?
According to Public Health France, the disease would be “more serious in children and in immunocompromised people”. SPF specifies that it can be complicated by superinfection of skin lesions or respiratory, digestive or ophthalmological or neurological damage. While some people are thus more prone to developing a severe form of the virus, the cases reported in Europe are mostly mild, and there are no reported deaths.
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The General Directorate of Health (DSG) announced, on Tuesday May 24, 2022, the detection of two new cases of monkey pox in France, bringing the number of infected to 3. As during the very first contamination, the Ministry of Health clarified that “as soon as the suspicion of his infection, this person was taken care of. In the absence of gravity, he is isolated at his home”. The first patient was “a 29-year-old man with no history of travel to a country where the virus is circulating”. To stem the circulation of the virus, the health authorities announced that an “in-depth epidemiological investigation would be implemented by the teams of Public Health France” and that “the people who have been in close contact with these patients are being identified” .
The number of contaminations remains for the moment quite limited, we note in Europe a more important phenomenon of transmission in the United Kingdom, unless the services of the health authorities have developed more efficient means to identify new cases of monkey pox. Below, find a table, carried out by the media BNO Newslisting new cases and updated daily.
According to the first findings of the World Health Organization (WHO), monkeypox originated in Central and West Africa. Countries such as Nigeria or Cameroon would be the main sources of origin. Known since the 1970s, this disease usually tends to develop in tropical areas. Seeing it develop in countries without this climate comes as a surprise to scientists.
Cases of monkeypox have been imported into Western countries since its discovery, including the United States, where they have remained “rare”, according to the US Centers for Disease Prevention and Control (CDC). Indeed, in the spring of 2003, cases had been confirmed in the country, thus marking the first appearance of this disease outside the African continent.
England was the first to sound the alarm. A first patient with monkeypox was identified there on May 7, it was a person returning from a trip to Nigeria. The British health security agency assures that with the exception of the first case detected, the transmission between the other cases would have taken place within the country. Since then, the number of cases has continued to increase: as of Tuesday, May 24, the number of cases recorded in the United Kingdom is 57.
Spain, Portugal, Canada and the United States have, in turn, reported having spotted the presence of monkeypox, or what appears to be, on their territory. Sweden and Italy followed. After the first French case on Friday May 20, two other contaminations were identified. This May 24, the number of cases recorded in the world exceeds one hundred. Nearly 20 countries are concerned.
According to the World Health Organization, monkeypox is contracted by “consumption of undercooked meat from infected animals.” Indeed, originally, it is an infectious disease caused by a virus transmitted by animals, mainly rodents. Human transmission would be the result of contact with a person already contaminated or with their organic fluids (saliva in particular).
But monkeypox can also be transmitted through close contact with infected respiratory tract secretions, skin lesions of an infected person, or objects recently contaminated with body fluids or material from a patient’s lesions. Sexual relations could thus spread the disease according to the British Health Security Agency. Protected intercourse is therefore recommended.
Symptoms resemble those of smallpox patients, but milder. In the first 5 days, the infection causes several symptoms: fever, headache, swelling of the lymph nodes (adenopathy), back pain, muscle pain (myalgia) and exhaustion (asthenia).
Within 1-3 days (sometimes longer) of the onset of fever, the patient develops rash symptoms that often start on the face and then spread to other parts of the body, including the palms of the hands , the soles of the feet and the mucous membranes (mouth and genital area). Itching is common. The lesions pass through different successive stages: macules, papules, vesicles, pustules and crusts. When the scabs fall off, people are no longer contagious.
The other mucous membranes (ENT, conjunctivae) may also be affected. “The incubation of the disease can range from 5 to 21 days. The fever phase lasts about 1 to 3 days. The disease, generally mild, most often heals spontaneously, after 2 to 3 weeks” emphasizes Public Health France .
If the symptoms seem virulent, especially in men, the mortality rate remains low. Indeed, the World Health Organization (WHO) affirms that “in general, the fatality rate has been between 1% and 10%, with most deaths occurring in the youngest”.
Two years after the start of the coronavirus epidemic, should we be worried about the spread of a new virus? According to Antoine Gessain, head of the epidemiology and physiopathology of oncogenic viruses unit at the Institut Pasteur, monkeypox presents only a low level of danger, as he explained to BFM-TV. No vaccine is necessary. He even wants to be reassuring: “there is not much risk of a major pandemic.”
Some countries quickly adopted measures to prevent the spread of the virus. The health authorities of Portugal and Spain have thus triggered a national health alert. Italy said the situation was “under constant surveillance” and Swedish authorities are “now investigating with regional infection control centers to find out if there are more cases”.
Spain decided to take the lead. The Iberian kingdom said on Thursday that it was preparing to purchase thousands of smallpox vaccines, normally intended to fight against smallpox, an extremely serious disease that the WHO had declared eradicated in 1980. “We must find a way to quickly buy these vaccines because it is a very valuable tool to stop the epidemic”, commented to the Madrid daily El Pais Elena Andradas, the director general of public health for the community of Madrid. This vaccine is not intended to be administered to the general population, but only to contacts of confirmed cases.
According to an article in La Tribune, at the end of 2012, France had a strategic stock of 1st generation vaccines of more than 82 million doses. These stocks have been kept for 40 years by the Army Health Service (SSA).