Even as it continues to confound health experts, the World Health Organization said Tuesday that a recent outbreak of monkeypox cases in non-endemic countries is manageable.
There were 131 confirmed cases and 106 suspected cases of the disease as of Tuesday, according to the public health body. The cases are found in 19 countries outside of Africa.
The WHO said it was not certain if the spike in cases was the start of a larger epidemic or if a peak in transmission had already been reached.
Monkeypox is endemic to Central and West Africa. It can be spread by close contact with people, animals or material that has been exposed to the virus.
Health experts are perplexed by the recent spike in countries with no history of the disease and patients with no travel links to endemic countries.
The U.S., U.K., Canada, Australia, Italy, Spain and Portugal have all reported cases. Belgium became the first country to impose mandatory isolation for patients on Friday, while the U.K. urged close contacts of patients to sell-isolate.
The majority of cases are spread through sex. Health authorities have noted a particular concentration of cases among men who have sex with other men.
A section of skin tissue, harvested from a lesion on the skin of a monkey, that had been infected with monkeypox virus, is seen at 50X magnification on day four of rash development in 1968.Gay and bisexual men were told by the CDC to be on the lookout for symptoms if they have been in close contact with someone who may have the virus.
A notable proportion of recent cases in the UK and Europe have been found in gay and bisexual men so we are encouraging these men to be alert to the symptoms.
The Director for Global Infectious Hazard Preparedness at the World Health Organization, Sylvie Briand, said Tuesday that it is unlikely that the virus has changed. She said that it may have been driven by a change in human behavior as a result of the easing of Covid-19 social restrictions.
The West African strain of monkeypox has a mortality rate of 1%.
Briand said that they encourage you all to increase the monitoring of monkeypox to see where it is going and to understand where it is coming from.
The recent monkeypox outbreak was atypical, Jeremy Farrer, director of global health charity, told CNBC Monday.
Farrer said at the World Economic Forum that there had never been a monkeypox epidemic before.
He said that it is not yet a cause for concern for the general public.
That isn't the same as saying public health people shouldn't be worried. It is not the same as saying we must not act quickly. Is it a huge risk to the public? I don't think it is, as of today.
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