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“Currently, the number (of cases) is not increasing rapidly, but it is increasing.”
Ontario Medical Director of Health, Dr. Kieran Moore. Photo by YouTube / POSTMEDIA
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The Leeds, Grenville and Lanark District Health Unit reported on Monday its first case of laboratory-confirmed smallpox.
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The case adds up to the provincial total, which as of July 6, was 133 cases, according to Dr. Kieran Moore, Ontario’s medical director of health.
Most of these cases, however, have focused on the Toronto area or have involved someone with a connection to the city.
Moore said Ontario is not experiencing rapid growth in monkeypox cases and it looks like its vaccination strategy is working.
“Currently, the number (of cases) is not increasing rapidly, but it is increasing,” Moore said in a recent interview. “We believe it’s stabilizing in Ontario, in terms of non-rapid growth.”
Moore said the province has been working “diligently” to vaccinate those who have contracted the virus, as well as close contacts or anyone at risk of contact.
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“More than 8,000 people have received the smallpox vaccine, which we believe has good protection against smallpox,” he said.
The province is not looking to expand its vaccination strategy at this time, Moore said, adding that “it looks like it’s working.”
“Typically, this dose of vaccine has two doses 28 days apart,” Moore said. “We are reviewing whether we should go back to these 8,000 individuals and provide a second dose.”
Smallpox smallpox disease comes from the same family of smallpox-causing viruses, which the World Health Organization declared eradicated worldwide in 1980. Smallpox vaccines have been shown to be effective in combating smallpox. the smallpox virus.
Monkeypox is generally not easily transmitted between people and is transmitted by prolonged close contact through respiratory droplets, direct contact with skin lesions or body fluids, or by contaminated clothing or bedding. Symptoms may include rash, oral and genital lesions, swollen lymph nodes, headache, fever, chills, myalgia, and fatigue.
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The Leeds, Grenville and Lanark District Health Unit said in a press release that the most common risk factors for developing monkeypox infection include “sexual or intimate contact (e.g. partner.”).
Dr. Allison McGreer, an infectious disease specialist at Toronto’s Mount Sinai Hospital, said the increase in cases in the province “is not causing alarm,” but the situation is still “relatively fragile.”
“We don’t know what it will take to control the outbreak,” McGreer said. “We are not entirely sure that the virus has not changed enough to allow for more sustained transmission to populations.”
McGreer said there is no immediate risk to the majority of the monkeypox population.
With files from The Canadian Press.
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