The three cities in the U.S have been reported on infection by smallpox, Chicago, Philadelphia and Los Angeles County all announced their first monkeypox cases Thursday amid growing concerns about the outbreak in the United States.
The public health departments of all these three locations were on waiting for confirmation from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) for the presumed cases.
“The patient is an adult resident who recently traveled and had a known close contact to a case. Although the patient is symptomatic, they are doing well and not hospitalized. They are isolated from others,” the announcement came from Los Angeles County and also assured that the risk of growing cases of smallpox remained low.
Chicago on the other hand announced its concern on the case, “The Chicago Department of Public Health and Illinois Department of Public Health, announced today a single presumptive monkeypox case in an adult male Chicago resident with recent travel history to Europe,”
Meanwhile, Health Department Acute Communicable Disease Program Manager Dana Perella, said “The threat to Philadelphians from monkeypox is extremely low,” and the health department will not provide more details on the patient’s case and will remain anonymous to protect the privacy of the patient.
“Monkeypox is much less contagious than COVID-19 and is containable particularly when prompt care is sought for symptoms,” Perella added. “Vaccine to prevent or lessen the severity of illness is available through the CDC for high-risk contacts of persons infected with monkeypox, as is antiviral treatment for patients with monkeypox. I believe that residents and visitors should feel safe to do all the fun things Philadelphia has to offer, with the proper precautions.”
The U.S first confirmed a case of monkeypox was with a man in Massachusetts after traveling to Canada in the middle of last month. That came following several confirmed cases throughout Europe.
Now the CDC has confirmed monkeypox cases in 10 different states, without even including the states that are pending confirmation. On Thursday, the state of Georgia announced its first CDC-confirmed cases.
