By Our Reporter,
NATIONAL
The World Health Organization has called on the group currently most affected by the virus – men who have sex with men – to limit their sexual partners.
WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, who last Saturday declared monkeypox a global health emergency, told reporters that the best way to protect against infection was “to reduce the risk of exposure”.
“For men who have sex with men, this includes, for the moment, reducing your number of sexual partners, reconsidering sex with new partners, and exchanging contact details with any new partners to enable follow-up if needed,” he said on Wednesday.
A surge in monkeypox infections has been reported since early May outside the West and Central African countries where the disease has long been endemic.
Tedros said Wednesday that more than 18,000 cases of monkeypox have now been reported to WHO from 78 countries, with 70 percent of cases reported in Europe and 25 percent in the Americas.
Five deaths have been reported in the outbreak since May, and approximately 10 percent of those infected end up in hospital to manage the pain, he said.
Some of the signs and symptoms of the monkeypox deasease are blistering rash, appearing to mainly happen during close, physical contact, and monkeypox has so far not been labelled a sexually transmitted infection (STI).
Experts have also warned against thinking that only one community can be affected by the disease, stressing that it spreads through regular skin-to-skin contact, and also through droplets or touching contaminated bedding or towels in a household setting.
“Anyone exposed can get monkeypox,” Tedros said, urging countries to “take action” to reduce the risk of transmission to other vulnerable groups, including children, pregnant women and those who are immunosuppressed
Andy Seale of WHO.
But he said this was possibly only “a short-term message as we hope that the outbreak, of course, will be short-lived”.
He stressed that other measures would also be needed to bring down the number of cases, including spreading information about the symptoms to look out for and the need to isolate quickly, and access to tests and medicines.
