What is monkeypox?

Sherryn Groch reports,

The monkeypox virus originates in wild animals such as some species of rodents and primates, and occasionally jumps to people. Most human cases have been in central and West Africa, where the disease is endemic but, unlike COVID, it does not spread easily between people except through close contact, including via respiratory droplets and lesions, or touching contaminated clothes, linen or towels.

Health officials around the world are keeping watch for more cases because, for the first time, the disease appears to be spreading among people who didn’t travel to Africa. But they stress that the risk to the general population is low as the virus most commonly spreads from animals directly.

The monkeypox virus originates in wild animals such as some species of rodents and primates, and occasionally jumps to people. Most human cases have been in central and West Africa, where the disease is endemic but, unlike COVID, it does not spread easily between people except through close contact, including via respiratory droplets and lesions, or touching contaminated clothes, linen or towels.

The disease is usually mild, though there are two main strains: the more severe Congo strain, which has a mortality rate of up to 10 per cent of cases, and the West African strain, where the fatality rate is about 1 per cent or less. So far, the UK reports its cases are the West African strain, and further genomic testing is underway around the world.

The illness was first identified by scientists in 1958 after two outbreaks of a “pox-like” disease in research monkeys – thus the name monkeypox. (The first known human infection wasn’t until 1970, in a remote part of Congo.) But scientists now suspect smaller animals such as rodents are the main reservoir of the virus.

Read more here: https://www.smh.com.au/healthcare/what-is-monkeypox-and-should-we-be-worried-20220520-p5an52.html