Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Monkeypox Reaches Georgia As New York's Case Count Hits 4
The Georgia Department of Public Health on Wednesday announced the state’s first suspected case of monkeypox virus. DPH said a man who lives in metro Atlanta with a history of international travel has shown symptoms, but more testing is needed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to confirm the case. In the meantime, a DPH spokeswoman said the man is being monitored and the agency is doing contact tracing to find people he may have had contact with recently. The man was ordered into isolation and the length of time he must isolate depends on when his symptoms clear up. (Oliviero and Miller, 6/1)
New York has reported two more cases of what is presumed to be the monkeypox virus, bringing the total number of cases in the state up to 4. The New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene said in a Wednesday update that two more people had tested positive for orthopoxvirus in the Big Apple. "We will be conducting contact tracing and monitoring and will refer people for care if necessary. Monkeypox is rare in New York City, but we can prevent the spread," the department wrote on Twitter. (Musto, 6/1)
Spanish and Portuguese health authorities said Wednesday that the total confirmed cases of monkeypox across both nations have exceeded 250, Reuters reports. The Iberian Peninsula has served as the epicenter of the recent outbreak, which has swept across several European countries as well as the U.S. The emergence of the virus is notable as it is rarely found outside of Africa. Spain has documented 142 cases, up from 132 the previous day. Portugal reports a total of 119 cases, also an increase from 100 the previous day. (Chen, 6/1)
The World Health Organization (WHO) warned Wednesday that outbreaks of endemic diseases are becoming more frequent. The United Nations health agency's emergencies director, Dr. Mike Ryan, said that climate change is contributing to this issue, with drought forcing animals and humans to alter food-seeking behavior. As a result of this change, he noted that diseases that typically circulate in animals are increasingly jumping into humans. (Musto, 6/1)
As monkeypox cases continue to surge in countries once unfamiliar with the pox virus, Mike Ryan, MD, MPH, executive director for health emergencies at the World Health Organization (WHO) warned today that the ecological pressures of climate stress, drought stress, and animal food-seeking behavior will lead to more and more spillover events and new transmission chains of diseases that were once endemic in only small pockets of the world. (Soucheray, 6/1)
As health authorities in Europe and elsewhere roll out vaccines and drugs to stamp out the biggest monkeypox outbreak beyond Africa, some doctors acknowledge an ugly reality: The resources to slow the disease’s spread have long been available, just not to the Africans who have dealt with it for decades. Countries including Britain, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Switzerland, the United States, Israel and Australia have reported more than 500 monkeypox cases, many apparently tied to sexual activity at two recent raves in Europe. No deaths have been reported. (Cheng and Asadu, 6/1)
The man at the center of the White House’s biodefense strategy is only four months into his job, but he’s already facing down a fresh crisis. The Covid-19 pandemic led President Biden to recreate a position at the White House’s National Security Council to oversee global health security — and none too soon, since the man in the position, Raj Panjabi, is now in charge of the White House’s response to monkeypox. When Panjabi, a physician with extensive public health experience in Liberia was named to TIME magazine’s list of most influential people in 2016 for his work during the Ebola epidemic, his entry was written by former President Bill Clinton. (Cohrs, 6/2)
