Hong Kong health authorities warn doctors to stay alert for suspected monkeypox cases
- Centre for Health Protection sends out letter to help private doctors identify suspected monkeypox infections, advises possible cases to be isolated from other patients
- Health official Dr Chuang Shuk-kwan says she believes 21-day quarantine requirement for monkeypox patients is sensible policy
Health authorities in Hong Kong have asked local private doctors to be on the alert and report suspected monkeypox infections, pointing to Belgium’s 21-day quarantine for infected travellers as a sensible policy.
Outbreaks of the virus have been reported in 12 countries outside the African continent, with 92 cases being laboratory-confirmed and 28 more under investigation as of Saturday.
Despite Hong Kong having no reported cases of monkeypox, local health officials on Monday said they were monitoring the situation closely.
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What is monkeypox and should we be worried that it’s spreading?
“We will write a letter to private doctors later today to ask them to monitor and report any suspected cases,” Dr Chuang Shuk-kwan, head of the Centre for Health Protection’s (CHP) communicable disease branch, said at a regular Covid-19 press conference.
According to the World Health Organization, monkeypox is a member of the Orthopoxvirus genus in the family Poxviridae. It is a viral zoonotic disease that occurs primarily in tropical rainforest areas in Central and West Africa, but is occasionally exported to other regions.
Symptoms of the virus include fever, rashes and swollen lymph nodes. It can also lead to a range of medical complications.
Monkeypox is usually a self-limited disease with symptoms that last for two to four weeks. Some patients can potentially develop severe cases of the virus, with the current fatality rate standing at about 3 to 6 per cent.