Public health officials have confirmed three more cases of smallpox in the monkey, bringing the total number of known cases in the city to five.
On Thursday, Toronto Public Health (TPH) updated the crawler on its website indicating new cases. TPH says it is also investigating five more cases to determine if they are positive or negative.
The city reported last Thursday its first confirmed case of the disease. There have been 10 potential cases that have been negative so far.
“We continue to monitor monkeypox activity in Toronto,” TPH said in a tweet.
1/2: We continue to monitor the activity of
– @ TOPublicHealth
Nearly 550 cases have been reported in 30 countries, mostly among men. Quebec has reported 52 confirmed cases, while more than 50 confirmed or suspicious cases have been reported in the rest of the country.
Smallpox is a rare disease that originates from the same family of viruses that cause smallpox, which the World Health Organization declared eradicated worldwide in 1980, but is generally not easily spread among humans. and is transmitted by prolonged close contact.
Toronto Public Health says the virus is not as transmissible as COVID-19.
Smallpox smallpox is usually spread by close person-to-person contact through respiratory droplets, direct contact with skin lesions or body fluids, or indirect contact through contaminated clothing or sheets.
The health unit says symptoms of monkeypox include fever, headache, muscle aches, exhaustion, swollen lymph nodes and a rash that “often appears within days of the onset of symptoms.
“It starts in the face and extends to other parts of the body,” TPH notes.
Since the outbreak began in several countries around the world in early May, there have been no deaths.