Blitz Bureau
NEW DELHI: Amid one suspected case of Mpox detected in India, health experts on September 9 advised not to panic as the monkeypox virus (MPXV) has minimal pandemic potential.
The Government had reported a suspected case of Mpox in a young male patient in the country, who has been isolated in a designated hospital and is under investigation.
“There is no need to panic. While fatality remains high, transmission is possible only among close contacts,” Dr. Harshal R Salve, Additional professor, centre for community medicine at AIIMS, New Delhi, said.
“Subliminal infections are all minimal, hence chances of widespread pandemic with monkeypox is minimal,” he added.
“Mpox is a viral disease identified as fever, rash, and lymphadenopathy — a condition that causes lymph nodes to swell or become abnormally shaped or sized. It is a self-limiting disease and patients recover within 4 weeks,” Salve said.
The suspected case of Mpox in India comes amidst a global outbreak that has spread to about 13 countries in Africa, forcing the WHO to declare it a global health emergency. The outbreak is driven majorly by a more deadly strain — Clade 1b. Outside of Africa, Clade 1b has to date caused one case each in Sweden and Thailand.
It is immediately not clear whether the suspected patient in India is linked to the more deadly strain of Mpox.
“With the Government’s declaration of the first suspected case of Mpox, everybody is worried, but there is no need to panic. As the infection is being transmitted only through sexual or intimate contact, it will not become a big problem like Covid-19,” Dr. Ishwar Gilada, a noted HIV expert said.
However, he stressed the need to educate and train the medical community for managing, diagnosing and detecting Mpox properly. And to increase the effectiveness of laboratories in number and their workload.
Gilada, a Consultant in HIV/STDs, Unison Medicare and Research Centre, Mumbai, urged to start manufacturing the Mpox vaccine, which may not only help India but also low and middle-income countries. He also called on to “vaccinate people which are vulnerable to Mpox with smallpox vaccine on priority”.
