When monkeypox entered the US in 2003, it infected prairie dogs. “We know that ground squirrels are very susceptible to viruses and there are many different host species,” says Rimoin. “If monkeypox could end up in a wildlife reservoir outside of Africa, it would be a very complicated situation to navigate.”
To determine exactly how widespread the current outbreak is, the UK has selected monkeypox as a disease of concern, meaning that all health professionals and laboratories detect Suspected cases must be reported to the UK Health Security Authority (UKHSA).
David Heymann, an infectious disease epidemiologist at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine who has spent years studying monkeypox, said: “I think UKHSA did the right thing because they put the net. wider monitoring network. Sahara Africa.
“They will begin to determine if it is present in other populations. It’s early, and we don’t know which groups are really at risk other than MSM. And we expect there may be other groups. “
There are additional challenges ahead. Because the virus has been linked to the MSM community – although it is thought to be capable of spreading through all sexual networks – scientists say health officials will have to make it clear to the public. public to avoid monkeypox stigma. If vaccines begin to be deployed in a way that targets small populations, and the disease builds up a stigma, it could thwart contact tracing efforts, something that scientists have not been able to do. Epidemiological concerns may have occurred.
“There is concern about people wanting to identify themselves out of fear of stigma,” says Brownstein. “There is concern that this virus, like others, may be unfairly associated with certain subpopulations.”
There are also questions about the capacity of health care systems, already exhausted and stretched to their limits by the demands of Covid-19, and whether they can afford to ramp up the response to the disease. monkey pox or not.
“Public health infrastructure is hardly built to deal with a response to one virus, let alone two,” Brownstein said. “But there are a lot of people who are working very hard around case identification, contact tracing, testing. That’s certainly the potential for stress, and there could be burnout, but I don’t think public health can respond to this indifferently.”
While scientists feel that there is room for optimism – and we will see in the coming weeks and months whether the rate of new cases begins to decline – it is important that the outbreak is under control. happening must be taken seriously before the virus becomes too entrenched in society.
“I think the stakes are actually pretty high when we think about having a poxvirus that can circulate relatively efficiently in the human body,” Rimoin said. “If it establishes itself, we could end up in a situation where we will have to continuously devote already stretched resources to fighting a poxvirus that is spreading globally.”
