The United States has confirmed its first two cases of smallpox in children, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Director Rochelle Walensky said Friday.
Why it’s important: The CDC has said that children, especially those younger than 8, are among those at “particularly increased risk” for severe monkeypox disease.
What he’s saying: “Both of these kids come from people who come from the community of men who have sex with men, the community of gay men,” Walensky said in a virtual event with The Washington Post on Friday.
- Both children are “doing well,” he added.
The big picture: Men who have sex with men remain the most vulnerable to monkeypox, but in some countries that saw outbreaks before 2022, young boys died at higher rates from the disease, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).
- Epidemiologists have warned that the risk is not limited to any one community and that “someone who is not gay can get it just as easily as someone who is gay”.
- As of Thursday, the CDC had counted a total of 2,593 monkeypox cases in the US
- WHO officials have also raised the alarm that the outbreak “poses a real risk” to public health.
Dig deeper: Monkeypox offers a new cause for contact tracing