CHARLOTTE, N.C. — With over 600 people in Mecklenburg County on a waitlist for a monkeypox vaccine, public health officials said Monday the county had received more than 700 additional doses of the vaccine.
There have been 18 cases of monkeypox in Mecklenburg County and 27 total cases across North Carolina. Health officials confirmed the first case of monkeypox in Mecklenburg County Monday, just days after the first case of the illness was reported in North Carolina back in June.
Mecklenburg County Public Health said most monkeypox infections last 2-4 weeks. Monkeypox is a rare, but potentially serious, viral illness that typically involves flu-like symptoms, swelling of the lymph nodes and a rash that includes bumps that are initially filled with fluid before scabbing over.
Mecklenburg County health leaders are working with the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services and the patient's health care provider to notify any individuals who were in contact with the patient while they were infectious. Monkeypox is typically spread through skin-to-skin contact.
The county reports an expanded eligibility to get the vaccine, which now includes:
1. Anyone with close contact with a confirmed monkeypox case.
2. Men who have sex with men who can report one of the following in the last 90 days: Multiple or anonymous partners, STI diagnosis, or taking HIV PrEP.
While the current at-risk factors point to a specific sexual orientation group, Dr. Raynard Washington, Mecklenburg's County Public Health Director, said it is important to remember that anyone can get monkeypox and the reason certain communities happen to be at-risk has to do with the origins of the outbreak. He reminds that it is not a sexually-transmitted disease and mostly passes through close, skin-to-skin contact.
"It could be a whole different group of people, but in fact, because of the way the outbreak got started in the country, that's the group that's most impacted," Washington said.
How monkeypox compares to COVID-19
The CDC still ranks monkeypox as "low" risk to the general U.S. population, since the virus does not spread easily without close contact.
"It is not in any way as easily spread as COVID or many of the infections we're used to, which is a good thing," Dr. Katie Passaretti, vice president and enterprise chief epidemiologist for Atrium Health, said. "It's not the same situation as COVID."
Since May 2022, more than 3,500 cases have been reported worldwide, with at least 172 cases identified in the United States. The World Health Organization has linked one death to this outbreak.
WHO again considers declaring monkeypox a global emergency
As the World Health Organization's emergency committee convenes Thursday to consider for the second time within weeks whether to declare monkeypox a global crisis, some scientists say the striking differences between the outbreaks in Africa and in developed countries will complicate any coordinated response.
African officials say they are already treating the continent's epidemic as an emergency. But experts elsewhere say the mild version of monkeypox in Europe, North America and beyond makes an emergency declaration unnecessary even if the virus can't be stopped. British officials recently downgraded their assessment of the disease, given its lack of severity.
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