The World Health Organization has issued a caution to persons sick with monkeypox to segregate themselves from animals after reporting the first documented instance of human-to-dog transmission in the Lancet medical journal.
This is the first recorded instance of human-to-animal transmission, and we believe it is the first incidence of infection in dogs, according to Rosamund Lewis, WHO technical officer for monkeypox.
Although epidemiologists were aware of the risk of such transmission, and certain public health organisations advised people who were already afflicted to isolate from their pets, no particular incident was reported until last week.
According to the Lancet article, two homosexual guys live in a Paris flat with their Italian dog. They noticed wounds on their dog 12 days after their symptoms started and admitted to sleeping with their dog.
According to DNA study, the virus that infected the dog was the same type that infected its owners.
While the World Health Organization’s director of emergencies, Mike Ryan, acknowledged that the dog’s infection was not unexpected, he cautioned that what we do not want to see is the disease being transmitted from one species to another, then staying in that species and moving within a new species, because the virus is able to adapt, and then the adaptation to those new species is stimulated to evolve in this way.
However, Sylvie Briand, WHO’s head of global infectious hazards preparation, indicated that there is now no cause for worry. Dogs can become infected for the first time; however, this does not suggest that the dog can transfer the disease and infect other dogs, nor does it imply that a dog can re-infect a human if sick.
Monkeypox was designated a public health emergency of worldwide concern by WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus last month, bypassing the organization’s emergency committee for the first time since its creation in 2005. The group had opted not to raise their hands for the second time. Despite arguments such as the absence of viral mortality and the fact that it was spreading almost entirely among homosexual males, the outbreak was labelled an emergency.
According to the World Health Organization, roughly 35,000 people worldwide have acquired monkeypox, a virus related to chickenpox that is generally prevalent in Africa, since the outbreak began in May. Last week, there were 7,500 new cases recorded, a 20 percent rise over the previous week.
The virus has been identified in 92 countries, with Europe and the Americas accounting for the vast majority of infections.
While monkeypox is not transmitted sexually, it is transferred by close contact, particularly skin-to-skin contact, contact with body fluids, and touching objects and surfaces used by an infected person.
The World Health Organization has issued a warning to pet owners about monkey pox.
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