It was already known from clinical reports that medication like Tecovirimat works as a therapy: Now experts from the Goethe University in Frankfurt am Main and from the University of Kent (Canterbury) have study results in the New England Journal of Medicine released. (You can read the study in English here.)
The background: The monkeypox virus is closely related to the smallpox virus (variola virus), which caused large outbreaks with high death rates of around 30 percent until it was eradicated by vaccination in the late 1970s.
People with a weakened immune system, the elderly, pregnant women, newborns and small children are particularly at risk from a severe course. The death rate regarding three percent.
Until recently, monkeypox was only found in certain parts of Africa when humans contracted it through contact with wild animals, primarily rodents such as the Gambian hamster rat or the red-shanked squirrel. Since May last year, however, a large monkeypox outbreak outside of Africa has been registered practically worldwide and for the first time.
84,000 diseases in 110 states
The viruses spread exclusively through human-to-human transmission. This is new and may have something to do with mutations in the pathogens. The WHO has classified it as a “public health emergency of international concern”. After all, by the beginning of the year around 84,000 cases of monkeypox had been registered in around 110 countries worldwide. The death toll was 75 at the time.
About 10 percent of monkeypox patients require hospital treatment.
In addition, the current monkeypox outbreak differs from previous outbreaks not only in its transmission path, but also in the symptoms of the disease.
