A case of suspected monkeypox is being investigated, officials in Sacramento announced on May 24.
If confirmed, it would be the first known case in California.
The patient recently traveled to areas in Europe where cases of monkeypox have been confirmed, the Sacramento County Division of Public Health said in a statement, without naming the countries.
Cases have been confirmed in Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal, Scotland, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom, according to the World Health Organization and the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and Prevention.
Officials believe the California person has monkeypox, due to their symptoms and preliminary testing.
Confirmation tests from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the California Department of Public Health are pending.
For now, the person is isolating at home and avoiding contact with other people.
Officials declined to give more information about the person, including whether it is a man or a woman. The person’s health care provider alerted the county on May 21 to the possible case, Dr. Olivia Kasirye, the county’s public health officer, told a briefing.
A single case of monkeypox has been confirmed in the United States, according to the CDC. That person tested positive in Massachusetts after traveling from Canada.
Six other cases were being investigated—two in Florida, two in Utah, one in New York, and one in Washington state—CDC officials told reporters on a call on Monday.
The U.S. supply of monkeypox vaccine will be used among people who have been exposed, the officials said.
Dr. Ashwan Vasan, New York City’s health commissioner, told reporters Tuesday that one suspected case of monkeypox tested negative but the other appears likely.
“But I want New Yorkers to feel a little bit reassured. This is not a highly transmissible and deadly virus. This is a relatively mild respiratory virus that is traveling by droplets, which means you need to have prolonged contact with someone, prolonged close contact with someone in order to transmit,” he said. “It transmits more like [tuberculosis] than it does like COVID. But we will say when you’re indoors, wear a mask—that’s going to protect you from whatever exposures, including COVID, including monkeypox.”
Monkeypox is an orthopoxvirus that causes symptoms that are similar to, but not as severe as, the symptoms that smallpox causes. Monkeypox is often found in areas of Africa, but not in the rest of the world.
Starting in mid-May, cases began appearing in countries outside Africa.
Health officials have said they expect additional cases of monkeypox to be detected and are recommending patients with symptoms, particularly people who traveled to African or European countries where cases were reported and men who engage in gay sex, to contact their health care providers.
“Many of those affected in the current global outbreak identify as gay and bisexual men,” said Dr. John Brooks, an epidemiologist at the CDC.
Symptoms include headache, fever, and chills. Most often, within one to three days after experiencing symptoms, the patient develops a rash. The patient heals after two to four weeks.
The incubation period for the disease is typically one to two weeks.
Monkeypox can prove fatal for as many as 10 percent of people who contract it, the CDC says, citing data from Africa.
Prevention techniques include avoiding contact with animals that could harbor the virus and isolating infected patients.
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