The Directorate General of Health (DGS) clarified this Friday that none of the monkeypox cases registered in Portugal are of the most dangerous variant of the disease (clade I), which first appeared on Thursday in Sweden.
In response to the Lusa agency, the DGS explained that “all cases registered in Portugal belong to clade I IIb of the monkeypox virus, while no cases from clade I have been identified.”
On Thursday, after Sweden registered its first case of a more contagious and dangerous variant of the disease, the World Health Organization (WHO) warned of the possibility of other imported cases of smallpox, formerly known as monkeypox.
According to DGS, from June 1, 2023 to July 31, 2024, 244 cases of MPOC were registered in Portugal.
Three new cases were reported between May and July 2024.
The GDG also warns of the importance of early case detection, diagnosis, prevention and control mechanisms to reduce chains of transmission when new cases emerge.
The health authority also recommends preventive vaccination of the population at highest risk of infection.
In Portugal, the first alert about the disease dates back to May 3, 2022, when the National Institute of Health Dutor Ricardo Jorge (INSA) laboratory confirmed five cases of infection with the MPOX virus.
In June 2023, a second outbreak was identified, and three months later, no cases of the disease were reported in the country.
This second outbreak has the same epidemiological and clinical profile as the first. Almost all of the cases are men between the ages of 19 and 64.
Since the vaccine became available on July 16, 2022, up to July 31 this year, 9,391 people have been vaccinated. Of the 16,706 vaccinations, 15,400 (92%) were given before infection, according to the latest report from health authorities.
On Wednesday, the WHO already declared the smallpox outbreak in Africa a global health emergency, with confirmed cases among children and adults in more than a dozen countries and a new variant in circulation.
It is the second time in two years that the infectious disease has been considered a potential threat to international health. The alert was initially issued in May last year after its spread was contained and the situation was considered under control.
The new variant can be easily transmitted through close contact between two people without the need for sexual contact and is considered more dangerous than the 2022 variant.
Mpox is transmitted primarily through close contact with infected people, including sexual contact.
Unlike previous outbreaks, where lesions were mostly seen on the chest, arms and legs, the new strain causes mild symptoms and lesions on the genitals, making it difficult to identify, meaning people could infect others without knowing it.
Mpox was first detected in humans in 1970, in what is now the Democratic Republic of Congo (formerly Zaire), with the Clade I subtype (of which the new variant is a mutation) spreading since then largely to West and Central Africa, where sufferers are typically infected by infected animals.
In 2022, a worldwide epidemic of clade II subtype spread to over a hundred countries where the disease was not endemic, affecting mainly homosexual and bisexual men.
Author: Lusa
Source: CM Jornal
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