As the World Health Organization recently declared Monkeypox as a global health emergency, the Department of Health has issued infographics and awareness campaigns for the new threat. Here are some collated facts about the disease from the WHO, DOH and other international health ministries:
What is Monkeypox?
Monkeypox is a rare viral disease first discovered in Central and West Africa back in 1958, which includes the smallpox or variola virus along with the vaccinia virus which can infect humans, animals as well as surfaces of objects with contamination of the virus.
The WHO mentioned in its advisory two weeks ago that Monkeypox is relatively similar to smallpox, however, it is less transmissible.
The Monkeypox virus is also slower in mutating as it belongs to the DNA virus family, unlike the COVID-19 virus which belongs to the RNA family of viruses which evolve a lot faster and are more transmissible.
How do you know you’re infected with Monkeypox?
Scientists shared their studies of the virus to international media, illustrating that Monkeypox has similar effects with smallpox yet it has milder symptoms.
The early symptoms of the disease are headaches, fever, swollen lymph nodes, chills, feeling of exhaustion, muscle pain/aches, backpains.
After 3 days or more after the initial symptoms, infected individuals usually get rashes that start as reddish flat then progressing to bumps filled with water, pus and to becoming a crust.
Health experts reveal that the rashes usually start on the face of infected people before progressing to body parts including genital areas.
There is also a wide time from infection period to showing of symptoms which can range from 5 to 21 days making it very hard to track.
The health department also told reporters that being sick with the disease may take from 2 weeks up to a month.
How is it transmitted?
Transmission of the virus is the typical close contact infection from animals, humans and surfaces of objects contaminated by the virus.
Scientists have bared that the virus may enter a person’s system through the respiratory tract (eyes, nose, mouth) and even through broken skin.
How is it cured? Is it Deadly?
The Department of Health and the WHO said for most individuals, symptoms of the Monkeypox disease usually resolve on their own without specific treatment.
In short, proper nutrition, hydration and plenty of rest with ample time are enough to treat it.
However, reports show that it is risky for children, immunocompromized people and pregnant women.
The DOH released an awareness advisory saying that there is a casualty rate expected of up to 10% from Monkeypox.
There is still no vaccine for the disease, but the WHO said the smallpox vaccine is seen to provide up to 85 percent of protection against it, however these vaccines are no longer available.
Meanwhile, the European Medical Association (EMA) has started developing an anti-viral called “tecovirimat” originally designed to combat smallpox.
EMA has recently licensed the anti-viral agent basing from recent studies, however, it is still not globally available.
For now, the DOH said isolation from suspect cases, proper hand hygiene, cleaning of surfaces of objects and similar safety protocols to COVID-19 may be used to prevent infection from the new virus.
So far, the health department still has no detected cases of the Monkeypox disease in the country as it has already set border control and designation of isolation facilities. TNF