Experts are beginning to fear that we have missed a crucial opportunity to contain the spread of monkeypox.
Most health experts believe that the near-global monkeypox outbreak may well become a second pandemic, if it isn’t already. The number of monkey pox infections continues to increase steadily.
The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported on June 21 more than 12,500 infections worldwide. This means more than a fourfold increase in the number of cases compared to a month ago. But 223 cases came from countries that have more frequent records of monkey pox.
More infections means that more and more people will die from the effects of the disease and that the virus has more and more opportunities to mutate. “We are in uncharted territory with this outbreak… and the event is just getting started,” James Lawler, an infectious disease expert, told The Daily Beast.
Effective vaccine, relatively low death rate and probably no airborne spread
The American epidemiologist Eric Feigl-Ding declared in May that the death rate from monkey pox in Africa was particularly high at about 15 percent and that children in particular would be very sensitive to the virus. However, the epidemiologist predicted at the time that this death rate would be much lower in the West due to a better health system.
That prediction seems to be correct for now. Since July 4, according to the World Health Organization (WHO) only about three deaths among infected patients.
Existing vaccines against smallpox are also said to be about 85 percent effective against monkeypox. Adults who previously received that vaccine would still enjoy enormous protection against the ‘monkeypox’. Persons under the age of 50 who never received this shot could still receive a vaccine within four days of being infected with monkeypox and adequate protection can build.
The monkeypox also spreads in a different way than the coronaviruses that cause COVID-19. The disease is passed on through close physical contact. Although not a sexually transmitted disease, sexual contact is considered extremely risky because there is intense skin-to-skin contact during sex. The virus could also travel short distances via saliva, although that distance may not be far enough to claim that the monkeypox can infect through the air.
“By the time we realized that something was wrong, we were already behind”
However, it is still worrying that the virus is now present in 63 countries, 57 of which normally never have cases of the virus. The virus is normally mainly active in West and Central Africa, where it is an endemic disease.
“Monkeypox is clearly a global health emergency. The disease has been simmering in small groups in central and western Africa for decades, but so far there have been no cases in the rest of the world unrelated to travel. Now it is present in almost every region of the world and is spreading rapidly.” believes public health law specialist Lawrence Gostin.
“By the time we realized that things were going on, we were already behind,” concludes the expert.
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