Monkeypox Vaccine: As Cases Rise Across the US, Here's Everything You Need To Know About the Possible Vaccination

As more than a dozen countries grapple with outbreaks of monkeypox, health officials worldwide are rushing to assess reserves of vaccines and treatments that may be needed to contain the spread.

According to experts at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the US emergency stockpile has two vaccinations licensed by the Food and Drug Administration that might be used to contain monkeypox.

Is There a Vaccine For Monkeypox?

More than 100 million doses of the original smallpox vaccination are stored in the stockpile. However, that vaccination has been linked to negative effects and should not be administered to some people, especially those who are immunocompromised.

Jynneos, a newer vaccine, was authorized in 2019 for the protection of both smallpox and monkeypox. The CDC's stockpile has over 1,000 doses, according to Dr. Jennifer McQuiston, deputy director.

Still, the scope of the problem in the United States is unknown. Officials have verified only one case in Massachusetts, as of Monday, and were assessing four more people.

The situation in other parts of the world is more worrying. There were more than 100 confirmed cases in 14 countries outside of Africa as of Monday, with dozens more under investigation. The European Center for Disease Prevention and Control asked European health professionals to check the availability of smallpox vaccinations, antivirals, and personal protective equipment on that day, according to the New York Times.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention confirmed that the monkeypox case in the United States is a guy from Massachusetts, and the four orthopox cases are males from New York, Florida, and Utah. The word "orthopox" refers to all pox viruses. McQuiston recommended that doctors treat orthopox patients as if they had monkeypox.

As per McQuiston, the CDC expects to receive samples from the four possible cases today or tomorrow for further analysis. The CDC's Laboratory Response Network can screen for an orthopox virus, and then the agency verifies monkeypox using PCR testing, which takes a couple of hours, she noted.

The CDC sequenced the material from the confirmed case in Massachusetts quite fast, and researchers were able to see that it closely matched that of a case in Portugal within 48 hours.

Monkeypox is not transmitted during intercourse but can be transmitted through touch during sex, according to Dr. John Brooks, the CDC's senior medical officer for HIV prevention. Anyone may contract or spread monkeypox, but homosexual and bisexual males account for a sizable proportion of cases in the current worldwide outbreak.

The CDC opted to hold a news conference on the outbreak now, according to Brooks since LGBTQ Pride month normally begins around Memorial Day weekend, and authorities wanted to make sure the community was aware of the problem. He also advised clinicians to be on the watch for the condition, which might resemble other forms of STDs, CNN reported.

What Is Jynneos Vaccine For?

When asked if anyone in contact with confirmed or suspected monkeypox patients had received the Jynneos vaccine, which the US ordered millions of additional doses of last week, McQuiston said there had been a request for the Jynneos vaccine to be released from the National Stockpile for some of the early patients' high-risk contacts.

Despite not being formally verified, the four suspected instances in the United States are extremely likely to be monkeypox since testing has revealed that the pathogen involved is from the orthopoxvirus family, which includes both monkeypox and smallpox. The CDC anticipates that samples from the cases will be analyzed for final confirmation this week. In 2003, a minor outbreak of monkeypox, which is generally seen solely in Africa, emerged in the United States for the first time.

Smallpox was proclaimed globally eliminated in 1980, and no spontaneously occurring cases have been discovered thereafter. The Jynneos vaccine was created in part to address continued worries that the virus, which had a mortality rate of roughly 30%, may resurface as a bioterrorism agent. Monkeypox is still uncommon, with a death rate estimated to be between 1 and 10%.

By the World Health Organization, there are presently at least 92 instances of monkeypox in 12 countries, with many more probable cases being investigated. President Joe Biden stated on Sunday that the globe "should be concerned" about the virus spreading further, as per Newsweek.