To curb the spread of Monkeypox in the Montreal area, Quebec will begin injecting select individuals with a smallpox vaccine.
On Thursday, Dr. Luc Boileau, Quebec’s director of public health, announced that the province has now confirmed 25 cases of Monkeypox. Fourteen of them are located in Montreal. However, they are all connected to the broader Montreal area.
According to Boileau, there are another 20 to 30 cases being investigated.
Monkeypox is “a serious situation,” Boileau stated, but it is not spreading through the community like COVID-19.
“We aren’t expecting a rapid, huge number of cases,” he explained. “That’s why we think it can be eradicated.”
The vaccine, which was approved in 2020 for the prevention of smallpox and other orthopoxviruses, has been demonstrated to prevent Monkeypox in animal experiments, according to Dr. Caroline Quach, chair of Quebec’s immunization committee.
She stated that the vaccine should be given within four days of exposure but could be given up to two weeks later.
“Data have shown that if you give it within four days, you have a very good effectiveness in preventing the illness,” Quach said. “If you administer it between Day 5 and 14, it might not prevent disease, but it might modify the evolution.”
Adult men who have had sexual encounters with men make up the “vast majority” of cases.
According to Boileau, one case involves a minor who has been to school since being exposed.
Unlike other transmissible diseases like the coronavirus, the virus requires close and extended contact to spread. “So it’s not like an entire classroom would suddenly be affected,” Quach said.
When it comes to Monkeypox, Boileau stated that the government is “not in a community alert situation.”
Dr. Geneviève Bergeron, Montreal’s medical officer in charge of health crises and infectious diseases, noted that contact tracking and isolation are also being utilized to prevent the spread.
Dr. Sébastien Poulin, an infectious disease specialist at the Saint-Jérôme Hospital outside Montreal, believes that targeting close contacts for vaccination makes sense.
“I believe it’s reasonable because we can’t forget that at present, there haven’t been any severe cases; there haven’t been any deaths,” he said in an interview. While the disease can be uncomfortable, Poulin said, “we’re not talking about human smallpox; we’re not talking about a deadly virus.”
Patients exhibited flu-like symptoms before developing a rash during previous outbreaks of monkeypox in central and west Africa, according to Poulin.
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