BRITS who have had close contact with monkeypox patients should self-isolate for 21 days, the government now says – as more cases are set to be announced on Monday.
The updated guidance from the UK Health Security Agency also warns those at risk of infection to stay away from pregnant women, kids under 12 and people with suppressed immunity.
Those high risk contacts include people sharing a house, sexual partners or even someone changing an infected person’s bedding without wearing the appropriate PPE.
They should also be offered a vaccine, the UKHSA said.
The guidance – which is not a legal requirement – comes after Belgium became the first country to introduce mandatory 21-day quarantine for monkeypox patients.
As the outbreak explodes across Europe, doctors are warning new infections of the disease are being detected on a daily basis and will rise significantly.
Read More on Monkeypox
On Friday the total number of confirmed cases in the UK more than doubled to 20 and that is expected to rise again when the latest figures are released on Monday.
One of the cases in the UK is thought to be a child who is currently in a critical condition in a London hospital.
The cause of the outbreak in Britain is not yet known as there is “no obvious connection” between those infected to a single event, according to the UKHSA’s Dr Susan Hopkins.
But in Spain – which has more than 50 known cases – authorities have linked some to a sauna in Madrid.
Other cases in Spain and Italy are linked to a festival attended by crowds of 80,000 in Gran Canaria.
Meanwhile, US President Joe Biden has said the outbreak is “a concern”.
And Austria‘s first case of monkeypox was confirmed on Sunday, Vienna’s health authority said.
Israel also recorded its first case this weekend.
Belgium currently has three cases, all of which were recorded on Friday and are linked to the four-day Darklands Festival in port city Antwerp.
Organisers said: “There’s reason to assume that the virus has been brought in by visitors from abroad to the festival after recent cases in other countries.”
Dr Hopkins, a chief medical adviser at the UKHSA, was asked about the risk to Brits attending summer festivals, as well as children on sunshine holidays.
She said the illness is “relatively mild” in adults, with young children thought to be more at risk.
“The risk to the general population remains extremely low,” she said.
But she added: “People need to be alert to it, and we really want clinicians to be alert to it.”
Initial symptoms include a viral illness, before a chickenpox-type rash spreads across parts of the body.
Anyone who feels ill must “stay at home”, Dr Hopkins said.
“If you have a rash, immediately seek medical care, either by calling your GP or a sexual health clinic,” she said.
She said early symptoms are “non-specific” and feel “like a viral-type infection”.
In later stages, people develop a rash, usually to the face, hands and arms, that can also affect genital areas.
“It starts as red spots and moves to vesicles – those are blister-type lesions that are a bit like chickenpox,” Dr Hopkins said.
“They scab over and once the scabs have fallen off, they’re no longer infectious.”
People infected with monkeypox will usually start to experience symptoms five to 21 days after initial infection
The NHS says the first symptoms are:
They added that a rash usually appears one to five days after the symptoms.
However, medics believe some people are contracting the virus after a sexual encounter as the virus can spread more easily through personal contact.
Dr Hopkins says it seems to be particularly prevalent in gay and bisexual men.
Anyone changing sexual partners regularly or having close contact with people they don’t know should come forward if they develop a rash, she said.
Yesterday, Dr Claire Dewsnap, president of the British Association for Sexual Health and HIV, said the medical community is bracing for more as the virus spreads.
She told Sky News: “What worries me the most is there are infections across Europe, so this has already spread.
“It’s already circulating in the general population.
“It could be really significant numbers over the next two or three weeks.”
Meanwhile, it has emerged experts warned three years ago that monkeypox would “fill the void” left by smallpox.
Scientists from leading institutions including the University of Cambridge and the London School of Tropical Hygiene and Medicine said the disease would evolve to fill the “niche” left after smallpox was eradicated in 1980.
Although monkeypox is usually mild, it can prove fatal in rare cases. The strain causing the current outbreak kills an average of one in 100 infected.
According to the Sunday Telegraph, the experts attended a seminar in London back in 2019 and discussed how there was a need to develop “a new generation vaccines and treatments”.
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Their discussion was published in the Vaccine journal in 2020.
Monkeypox, which was first found in monkeys, can be transmitted from person to person through close physical contact – including sex.
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