UK detects another 14 monkeypox cases

Another 14 monkeypox cases have been identified in England, as scientists warn the virus has evolved ‘far more than expected.

The UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) today confirmed the additional cases, bringing the UK-wide total in the ongoing unprecedented global outbreak to 71.

England has logged 70 of the cases, while Scotland yesterday confirmed its first-ever case of the virus.

At least one child has been sickened. No one has died yet.

Seventeen countries have now detected the virus this month in an unprecedented global outbreak, sparking concerns it may have learned to spread easier among humans.

Portuguese virologists, tasked with conducting Covid-like studies to trace the virus’s evolution, claim the strain currently circulating is very similar to one that cropped up in Britain four years ago.

But samples taken from a handful of patients struck down in the fresh outbreak suggest the virus has collated an extra 50 mutations.

Researchers wrote that this was ‘far more than one would expect considering the estimated substitution rate for orthopoxviruses’. They also warned that an ‘evolutionary jump’ — like with the Covid Omicron strain — may have created a ‘hyper-mutated virus’.

Meanwhile, the Danish manufacturer of the smallpox vaccine, which is also effective against monkeypox, last year warned outbreaks were becoming more frequent. It claimed it could be down to the virus’s ‘genetic evolution.

However, experts are still analysing the monkeypox genome and the World Health Organization (WHO) yesterday said there is no sign that the virus has mutated. The strain currently circulating is much milder than others.

Sporadic monkeypox infections are spotted outside of Africa, where the virus is endemic in animals. Imported outbreaks have always fizzled out naturally after a few cases, however.

Fifty-seven people in Britain have already been sickened and Health Secretary Sajid Javid yesterday warned the worst was still to come.

Health chiefs are alarmed about the cluster of cases, which has disproportionately struck gay and bisexual men. Yesterday experts warned that monkeypox could spread to pets and wildlife and become endemic in Europe.

A senior WHO official yesterday claimed the leading theory explaining the spread of the disease was sexual behaviour at two raves held in Belgium and Spain.

Meanwhile, experts at Portugal’s National Institute of Health in Lisbon, who analysed the monkeypox strains, said the multi-country outbreak ‘most likely has a single origin’ at a super-spreader event.

The disease, first discovered in lab monkeys in the late 1950s, is usually mild but can cause severe illness in some cases. It can kill up to 10 per cent of people it infects. The milder strain causing the current outbreak kills one in 100 — similar to when Covid first hit.

Monkeypox has an incubation period of anywhere up to 21 days, meaning it can take three weeks for symptoms to appear.

Symptoms include fever, headache, muscle aches, backache, swollen lymph nodes, chills and exhaustion.

A rash can develop, often beginning on the face, which then spreads to other parts of the body — including the genitals. The rash can look like chickenpox or syphilis, and scabs can form which then fall off.

Dr Joana Isidro and colleagues analysed nine genome sequences of monkeypox, gathered from patients infected with the virus during the latest outbreak.

The researchers calculated the virus is closely related to the same West African strain that was exported from Nigeria to Britain, Israel and Singapore in 2018 and 2019.

However, each virus had 50 extra mutations, on average, compared to the cases detected in previous outbreaks, the pre-print states.

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UK detects another 14 monkeypox cases