•The disease is usually found in remote
villages in Central and West Africa.
•The disease was first discovered in
laboratory monkeys in 1958.
•Monkeypox is related to the virus that
causes smallpox. There is no vaccine but
smallpox vaccinations might protect against
monkeypox.
•Symptoms include a fever, headache, chills
and a rash. Sources: The Associated Press/World
Health Organization
MADISON, Wisconsin (CNN) --Preliminary tests on two suspected cases of
human-to-human transmission of monkeypox have proved negative, a Wisconsin
public health official said Monday.
"The preponderance of the evidence is we don't have human-to-human
transmission," said Herb Bostrom, director of the Bureau of Communicable
Diseases in the Division of Public Health.
Although final test results could take weeks, "it's looking less and less"
like human-to-human transmission occurred, he said.
The two suspected cases were a medical assistant and a nurse who became ill
after coming into contact with patients with monkeypox. The nurse's boyfriend
also came down with symptoms. Bostrom said there was no need to test his blood
unless the nurse tested positive for the virus.
The patients were linked to an outbreak of the illness in seven Midwest
states traced to infected prairie dogs sold as pets.
At least 91 cases are under investigation, 20 of them confirmed, health
officials said Monday.
Wisconsin reported 41 cases, seven of them confirmed; Indiana, 26; Illinois,
19; Ohio, two; and Missouri,
Kansas and Arizona, one each.
If the nurse, the nurse's boyfriend or the medical assistant are confirmed to
have monkeypox, they would be the first known cases of human-to-human
transmission of the disease in the Western Hemisphere, according to the Centers
for Disease Control and Prevention.
Dr. Jeff Davis, Wisconsin's state epidemiologist and chief medical officer
for communicable diseases, said Friday that the reported illnesses "do not
appear to be cases of monkeypox."
Dr. Stephen Ostroff, deputy director of the National Center for Infectious
Diseases, part of the CDC, said human-to-human transmission would not be a
surprise but predicted it would never represent a significant concern, because
the virus "tends to burn itself out in humans."
Transmission would most likely occur through direct contact with the
pus-filled skin lesions that are hallmarks of the disease, Ostroff said.
Laboratory confirmation is critical because monkeypox symptoms -- which
include fever, chills and cough, followed by a rash and sometimes accompanied by
diarrhea, swollen lymph nodes, a sore throat and mouth sores -- can be caused by
other diseases.
The outbreak is believed to have begun with a shipment of more than 800
rodents, including 50 Gambian giant pouched rats, from Africa to a distributor
in Texas. The rats are believed to have passed the disease to the prairie dogs,
which were then sold or traded in the Midwest.
No human deaths have been reported in this outbreak, though the disease
typically has a 1 percent to 10 percent fatality rate in the rain forest
countries of Central and West Africa, where monkeypox is more common.
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