Monkeypox vaccines are now available for some health workers who treat infected people.
“I am delighted to report, even with the first case in Boston at Massachusetts General Hospital, our colleagues across the government have been able to bring vaccines to this hospital. And just yesterday they have already started offering the vaccines to health workers.
“The first part is to identify the infected and isolate them and make sure they get the care they need,” Panjabi said. “The second part is to make sure we vaccinate those who have been exposed to infected people. If we do it over and over again, and that’s our focus on the White House and the whole government, then we’ll be more likely to put end this outbreak “.
A senior Biden administration official said on Tuesday that vaccination could generally be offered to small groups of people who have been exposed to a symptomatic smallpox patient, but this is not a mass vaccination effort.
In the United States, the Jynneos vaccine, given in two doses four weeks apart, is authorized to prevent smallpox and smallpox in adults.
“Because the smallpox virus is closely related to the smallpox virus, the smallpox vaccine can protect people from getting the smallpox,” says the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website. of the USA. “Smallpox and smallpox vaccines are effective in protecting people from smallpox when given before smallpox exposure. Experts also believe that vaccination after smallpox exposure can help prevent smallpox. disease or make it less serious. “
Scientists have known for years that smallpox vaccines can also be effective in preventing smallpox. The smallpox virus that causes smallpox and the smallpox virus belong to the same family.
“Viruses come from the same family of viruses, and what we’ve seen in previous monkeypox outbreaks is that contact vaccination aborts the infection or attenuates the infection in those individuals with monkeypox,” Dr. Amesh said. Adalja, principal investigator at Johns Hopkins. Health Security Center.
But don’t expect a large-scale deployment of vaccines.
“I think we should use vaccines in case contacts. This is not something for everyone to line up and get vaccinated,” Adalja said of the current outbreak. “This will be crucial to stop the cases.”
What vaccines could work against monkeypox?
A senior government official said on Tuesday that there was enough vaccine to cover the current level of cases in the United States.
“Right now, we have more than 1,000 doses [Jynneos] available, and we expect this level to rise very rapidly in the coming weeks as the company provides us with more doses, “said Dr. Jennifer McQuiston, Deputy Director of the Pathogens and Pathology Division of the National Emergency Center. and CDC Pathology Zoonotic Infectious Diseases, he said Monday.
The CDC estimates that the vaccine is at least 85% effective in preventing monkeypox, based on data from Africa.
Another vaccine, called ACAM2000, is licensed in the United States to prevent smallpox. Although the vaccine may be used to prevent monkeypox, it is not authorized for this purpose.
The United States has more than 100 million doses of ACAM2000, McQuiston said.
“ACAM2000 is an older generation smallpox vaccine that has some significant potential side effects,” he said. “Therefore, a decision to use it widely should have a serious discussion behind it.”
ACAM2000 is a live virus vaccine, and once the vaccine is given, a lesion will develop at that site. Because the virus grows at the site of the injury, it can spread to other parts of the body or even to other people, according to the CDC, so people who get ACAM2000 “should take precautions” to prevent it from spreading.
In comparison, the Jynneos vaccine is given as a live virus that does not replicate. This means that there is no visible “prey” and, as a result, no risk of viral spread, according to the CDC. Some common side effects of the vaccine include injection site pain, muscle aches, headache, or fatigue.
Who should be vaccinated against monkeypox?
Most people will not be vaccinated against monkeypox. It is based on direct exposure.
The CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices voted last year to recommend vaccination to selected groups at risk for smallpox and other related viruses because of their occupations. This could include research laboratory staff and healthcare staff, for example, who treat infected people.
In the midst of the global outbreak, World Health Organization officials plan to make recommendations on who should be prioritized to receive a smallpox vaccine to reduce the risk of smallpox.
“We will make recommendations on who should be prioritized for this,” said Maria Van Kerkhove, WHO’s head of emerging diseases and zoonoses and technical director of Covid-19, during a question and answer session on social media on Monday.
“This is not something that everyone needs. It is a virus that is spreading among people who are coming into close contact with those who are cases,” Van Kerkhove said. “We really need to discuss evidence-based use of these measures, access and equity.”
Andy Seale, strategy adviser for WHO’s Department of Global HIV, Hepatitis and STIs, added that vaccines should be considered in countries where monkeypox is endemic, which are found in Africa. western and central.
“Communities are already telling us,‘ if we do it right, if we contain it, if we have the right of access for the outbreak, we must do the same for endemic countries, ’” Seale said.
Can anyone be vaccinated after being exposed to monkeypox?
According to the CDC, vaccination after exposure to the smallpox virus can still offer some protection.
“That’s the norm. We don’t usually vaccinate everyone beforehand. We use vaccination as post-exposure prophylaxis,” Adalja said.
“Because the smallpox of the monkey has a long incubation period, just like the smallpox – it is 12 days, on average, for the smallpox – you can intervene with a vaccine on an exposed person and it will abort the infection.” he said. “Or if you have an infection, it may come too late or late in the incubation period, it makes the infection less severe.”
But the sooner an exposed person receives the vaccine, the better. The CDC recommends that the vaccine be given within four days of exposure to prevent disease. If given between four and 14 days of exposure, vaccination may reduce symptoms, but may not prevent the disease itself.
In general, people who have been exposed to the monkeypox virus and have not been vaccinated for the past three years should consider getting vaccinated, according to the CDC.
Will a smallpox vaccine protect against smallpox?
There’s probably some “remnant” of monkeypox protection for adults who were vaccinated against smallpox when they were kids, Adalja said, but it may not be total protection.
“The smallpox vaccination program ended in the 1970s in the United States. Obviously, if someone is in the U.S. military and was vaccinated last year, I’m sure they’re completely protected,” Adalja said. “But people who were vaccinated as children at the time when smallpox was a routine childhood vaccination may have some residual immunity.”
A senior Biden administration official said on Tuesday that in theory, some protection is offered against a previous smallpox vaccination, but there is no good evidence of how much protection, and that protection could diminish over time.
Has the monkeypox virus changed with this outbreak?
The official said nothing seems to have changed about the biology of the monkeypox virus and that the chances of getting it are still very low for the general public.
WHO officials have found no evidence of a change or mutation in the monkeypox virus in the outbreak. Therefore, there is no evidence to suggest that authorized vaccines do not work against the virus that is currently circulating.
“It is a very stable virus. So we have no evidence yet that there is a mutation in the virus itself,” said Rosamund Lewis, head of the WHO Emergency Management Smallpox Secretariat, during the session. questions this Monday.
“We’re starting to gather this information,” Lewis added. “We will convene our groups of virologists and other experts to discuss this same issue based on the genome sequence of some of the cases being detected.”
This is a “key question” that is important to answer, said Dr. Daniel Rhoads, co-chair of the Microbiology Committee of the College of American Pathologists.
“Has anything changed with biology, or is it just an unusual situation that hasn’t happened before or haven’t we recognized before? I think every time there’s a change in geography for these endemic diseases, that’s a key question.” , he said. Rhoads, a pathologist at the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio.
“Whenever we see a new infection or an infection transmitted in a way that seems to be a new one, I always wonder, is this something we haven’t recognized before that has always existed? Or is it a real biological change, which would be due of a mutation in the virus? I don’t know, “Rhoads said.
“My guess is that once they sequence the virus that causes the current outbreak, they’ll be able to compare it to known sequences, and then hopefully we’ll have a glimpse of whether or not it’s the same old smallpox or not. there is something that seems different. “