The National Department of Health and a health expert have warned South Africans to remain vigilant and be on the lookout for mpox symptoms.
So far, three people have died due to mpox (also known as monkeypox).
The department is calling on the public to maintain vigilant and never lower their guard against mpox disease, as the country remains on high alert for a possible surge.
It said two more laboratory-confirmed cases of mpox were recorded last week and available scientific data suggests that the disease is transmitting from person-to-person within the borders of the country.
“This increases the total number of positive cases from 20 to 22 since the outbreak of mpox in May this year; the number of deaths remain at three.
“This is despite heightened public awareness and intensive contact tracing activities to curb the spread of the disease,” said national Health Departmental spokesperson Foster Mohale.
He said the latest cases include a 40-year-old man diagnosed at a private health facility in Durban, KwaZulu-Natal, on July 6. The patient is from Johannesburg, Gauteng, but travelled to Durban over the past weekend where mpox-like rash developed.
The other case is a man, 26, from Nqutu in KwaZulu-Natal, who presented with an mpox-like rash to a local hospital.
Mohale said both new cases self-identified as MSM with no international, but local travel history.
“The department would like to urge all people who experience any of the mpox symptoms, with or without an international travel history, to present themselves to a health facility for clinical observation and confine themselves to one place until their test results are available.
“Contact tracing and monitoring is ongoing in both provinces, especially among the close contacts of the patients. We urge all the identified and suspected contacts to co-operate with health officials during contact tracing for screening and possible diagnosis to prevent further transmission of this preventable and treatable disease,” Mohale said.
Director of the African Health Research institute, Professor Thumbi Ndung’u, speaking on ‘Newzroom Afrika’, said he thinks the challenge is that there may be cases that are spreading without being necessarily symptomatic.
“Most of the people that have come down with mpox symptoms are people who had some kind of immune deficiency, for example uncontrolled HIV infection or a case of diabetes or people who have weakened immune systems,” said Ndung’u.
There is some suspicion, although it hasn’t been proven yet, that there may be cases of mpox that are spreading in the general public, but perhaps not showing symptoms because of the fact that some of the people getting infected might have very good immune systems, he said. So the situation is a bit unclear at the moment, but that could be what is going on at the moment.
In order to understand the disease, Ndung’u advised people to look out for signs, which is typical rash and swollen lymph nodes, those are the most common symptoms of mpox infection.
“But there may be typical symptoms such as a fever, sore throat, also very commonly associated with mpox and fatigue, general fatigue.
“It is possible that there may be cases that are spreading without necessarily being symptomatic. So people need to be just vigilant, know what the risk groups are, and if you happen to be in in that risk group, seek medical attention as soon as possible, including when you get somewhat typical symptoms. So for example, pain in the rectum which is associated with mpox infection,” he said.
The Star