WHO Warns Monkeypox Could Accelerate as Cases Spread to Switzerland, Israel

WHO Warns Monkeypox Could Accelerate as Cases Spread to Switzerland, Israel
This 2003 electron microscope image shows mature, oval-shaped monkeypox virions (R) and spherical immature virions (L) obtained from a sample of human skin associated with the 2003 prairie dog outbreak. (Cynthia S. Goldsmith, Russell Regner/CDC via AP)
Jack Phillips
5/22/2022
Updated:
5/22/2022

Israeli and Swiss officials on May 22 confirmed monkeypox cases as the World Health Organization has warned that the virus could accelerate during the summer months.

Both nations said in their respective statements that they identified at least one infected person who had recently traveled. Israel said it was investigating other suspected monkeypox cases.

“This is a disease, not a pandemic,“ Israeli Health Minister Nitzan Horowitz wrote on Twitter. “This is a known disease with—usually—light symptoms that is not similar in any way to the coronavirus.”

He added that his agency is prepared to deal with the virus.

Horowitz didn’t give details about the Israeli case, but said the smallpox vaccine also can protect against monkeypox. The patient is a man in his 30s who had returned from a trip to western Europe, according to the Tel Aviv Sourasky Medical Center (Ichilov), where he’s been quarantined in mild condition.

In Switzerland, the person consulted a doctor because they had a fever and a rash and felt ill, officials said, adding that the person is in isolation at home and the illness is developing in a “benign” way. A person they had been in contact with has been informed, Swiss officials added.

So far, 80 monkeypox cases have been reported in North America, Europe, and Australia, WHO says. The virus is common in West and Central Africa.

Hans Kluge, WHO’s regional director for Europe, told news outlets over the weekend that cases could increase in a dramatic way.

“As we enter the summer season ... with mass gatherings, festivals, and parties, I am concerned that transmission could accelerate,” he said.

Weighing in on the rise in cases, President Joe Biden said on May 22 that Americans should be concerned about the virus, although he admitted that his advisers “haven’t told me the level of exposure yet, but it is something that everybody should be concerned about.”

“We’re working on it hard to figure out what we do and what vaccine, if any, may be available for it,” he said.

“But it is a concern in the sense that if it were to spread, it’s consequential. That’s all they have told me.”

Monkeypox is mostly reported in Central and West Africa, where hundreds of cases are reported yearly. The monkeypox virus was first reported in laboratory monkeys in 1958, and the first human cases were found in the Democratic Republic of the Congo in the early 1970s.

Symptoms of monkeypox—which is related to the smallpox virus—include fever, body aches, and rashes. Smallpox, which has been responsible for a number of pandemics throughout history, presents more severe symptoms.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said in a recent update regarding cases reported in the United Kingdom, that there was a “temporally clustered group of cases involving four people.”

“Some evidence suggests that cases among [homosexual males] may be epidemiologically linked; the patients in this cluster were identified at sexual health clinics,” the agency said. “This is an evolving investigation and public health authorities hope to learn more about routes of exposure in the coming days.”

Reuters contributed to this report.
Jack Phillips is a breaking news reporter with 15 years experience who started as a local New York City reporter. Having joined The Epoch Times' news team in 2009, Jack was born and raised near Modesto in California's Central Valley. Follow him on X: https://twitter.com/jackphillips5
twitter
Related Topics