Some monkeypox patients also have sexually transmitted diseases, CDC says

Some people recently diagnosed with sexually transmitted diseases also have monkeypox, the Center for Disease Control and Prevention said, because monkeypox is very similar to STDs, both are monitored and tested. I warn my doctor that I need it.

Rochelle Walensky, director of the CDC, said that some monkeypox patients have syphilis, herpes, gonorrhea, and chlamydia infections. The rash that is characteristic of monkeypox can resemble herpes and syphilis, Warensky said.

“It’s important to note that cases of monkeypox can appear like sexually transmitted diseases and can be mistaken for other diagnoses,” Warensky said in a phone call with reporters on Friday. Said. She said that symptomatic patients should be evaluated for all sexually transmitted diseases, not just monkeypox.

“Health care providers should not rule out monkeypox just because the patient has another diagnosis or another sexually transmitted disease,” Wallensky told reporters.

According to the CDC, the United States has confirmed 45 cases of monkeypox in 15 states and Washington, DC as of Thursday. No deaths have been reported. The current outbreak is unusual as the virus has spread outside West Africa and Central Africa and the disease has been around for decades. According to the CDC, more than 1,300 cases have been reported in 31 countries around the world.

Monkeypox usually begins with flu-like symptoms such as fever, headache, myalgia, chills, malaise, and swollen lymph nodes. The disease then progresses to a painful rash, which can spread throughout the body. According to the CDC, most patients recover in 2-4 weeks without special treatment.

However, during the current outbreak, some patients developed a rash only on the genitals or anus before experiencing flu-like symptoms, Warensky said. In some cases, she said the patient developed a rash without flu-like symptoms. In many cases, the localized rash has not spread to other parts of the body or has spread to only a small area, the CDC director said.

According to Warensky, people diagnosed with monkeypox at the time of the outbreak report close physical contact with other people infected with the virus. The virus can spread through sores, body fluids, or direct contact with substances such as clothing and sheets.

Warensky said it is unclear whether the virus can spread through semen and vaginal fluid like a sexually transmitted disease. The CDC also does not know if the virus can spread from people who are infected but have no or mild symptoms.

According to Dr. Jennifer McKistton, a CDC official, at least 75% of monkeypox patients in the United States were exposed to the virus while traveling abroad. According to the CDC, the majority of cases have been reported among men who have sex with men.

Some patients do not know how they caught monkeypox. This suggests that the virus may have spread at low levels in the United States, McKistton said. However, the CDC has not identified the cities or regions where the outbreak is occurring in the United States, she said.

“There are occasional sparse cases where we don’t know how we got monkeypox,” McKistton said. “Maybe they got it from someone they recently traveled to, but they’re not sure,” she said.

Montreal, Canada’s third-largest city, has reported an outbreak, McKistton said. Montreal is across the border between New York and New England.

Monkeypox can also spread through respiratory droplets when people are in close and lasting face-to-face contact, Warensky said. According to Warensky, the virus does not stay in the air or pass through shared airspace for short periods of time, such as in casual conversations at grocery stores. She said monkeypox was also not expected to spread from brief touches on the same item, such as doorknobs.

No aerial transmission of monkeypox has been reported, according to Dr. Raj Panjabi, who heads the White House’s Pandemic Countermeasures Office. The difference is that while respiratory droplets fall to the ground quickly, aerosol particles are much smaller and can remain in the air for extended periods of time. For example, Covid-19 spreads through aerosol particles. This is one of the reasons why it is highly infectious.

According to Punjab, the federal government provided 1,400 vaccine courses and 110 antiviral treatments for people with high-risk exposure or monkeypox infections. The United States has also conducted 300 tests so far on Ortopox, a family of viruses including monkeypox. If people test positive for orthopox, it is presumed that they have monkeypox until the Atlanta CDC confirms the diagnosis.

“We are working to make testing through public health laboratories more convenient and extend testing beyond public health laboratories through commercial partners,” Punjabi told reporters on Friday’s phone call. rice field.

According to Dawn O’Connell, who heads the Department of Health and Welfare in charge of inventory, the United States is currently inoculating 72,000 times of Jynneos, a smallpox vaccine that is also approved to fight monkeypox, in a strategic national stockpile. Ready to use. O’Connell told reporters that manufacturer Bavarian Nordic has also sent an additional 300,000 doses to the United States.

Jynneos is a double-dose vaccine approved by the Food and Drug Administration to prevent monkeypox over the age of 18. In the United States, there is also the ACAM 2000, an older-generation smallpox vaccine with more than 100 million doses that can also prevent monkeypox infections. Smallpox and monkeypox belong to the same viral family, but gold pox is much milder.

The CDC generally recommends Jynneos over ACAM 2000 because the latter vaccine can cause serious side effects. According to McKistton, there are currently not enough Jynneos doses in the supply chain to vaccinate everyone in the United States in the event of a public health emergency. As a result, she said the Jynneos vaccine was only given to those who would benefit most from it. She said the ACAM2000 plays a role in vaccination of people who are not at risk of side effects from the vaccine and helping them maintain an adequate supply of Jynneos for those in need.