On Tuesday, the first case of monkeypox was identified in Albany County, one of around 650 cases in New York. Around 50 cases of the rare viral disease have been found in Massachusetts since mid-May. With the COVID-19 pandemic still raging, public health officials are warily eyeing the new threat. The Massachusetts Department of Public Health describes the availability of vaccines as “extremely limited” nationally. WAMC spoke with Pittsfield Public Health Nurse Patricia Tremblay to find out how the county seat is preparing for monkeypox.
TREMBLAY: We are in close touch with the Mass Department of Public Health. They send out updates fairly frequently, at least weekly. They will be doing an intense webinar next week to give guidance to the local boards of public health with regard to this. I do know at this time, there is testing available under and we take guidance from the epidemiologists at the Department of Public Health with regard to who should be tested. There are at least five laboratory sites for testing and, like I said, we work closely with the department to identify people that would require testing.
WAMC: Now, at this time, who would require testing?
It would be people who were deemed to be very close contacts of a person who is a confirmed case with regard to having monkeypox.
What is the level of concern at this time? Obviously, with the COVID-19 pandemic still active, I'm sure a lot of folks hear news of a new transmissible disease and want to get a sense of the level of concern among public health professionals.
I think we're all watching very closely. We get our notice of people that are, that have tested positive or confirmed cases from the State Department of Public Health, and then we would immediately reach out to those folks and determine who the close contacts were and get in touch with those close contacts. At this point, it's watchful waiting.
What have we learned from the COVID-19 pandemic that might play into how public health policy dictates behavior during a new situation like this with monkeypox?
I think that testing is a critical part, and having enough testing available is important, as well as trying to get education out to the community with regard to what the status is of monkeypox, the number of cases in a community, as well as telling them, you know, what the risks are for people to get monkeypox.
Now, for those who don't know about monkey pox itself, what exactly is it?
It’s a virus that is similar to smallpox in the way that it presents, but it is an entirely different illness. At this point, it's usually, people get this from prolonged contact, which is three hours or greater, very close contact with somebody who has a positive case. And at this point, also, we are not seeing that right here in Pittsfield. But it is something that we are looking to watch. Right now the people that are at higher risk for monkeypox are, where they are seeing the cases, are in a population- It's a little bit different than how it normally presents, in that the people that have been tested positive have been in a very close contact, often a sexual contact, sometimes more focused, although not only, with gay population or men having sex with men.
There is a vaccine for monkeypox. Are we are at a point where you're interested in getting your hands on doses of the vaccine for Pittsfield?
I am not at this point, because there have not been cases here. And the State Department of Public Health is working diligently to make sure that we're appropriately educated about the need. We're looking at testing first, and you know, they are determining, help determining where the highest risk areas are and who should be having access to those, that medication.
Is there anything about monkeypox I haven't thought to ask you that you think it'd be important for the community to know?
I don't think it's a situation as COVID was where we're in a pandemic by any means, so that I don't think people should panic. I think that people should know that the Department of Public Health is very aware and is using the knowledge that we gained from the COVID outbreak to try to prevent the same thing from happening with regard to monkeypox. So I, you know, again, I think that they are ramping up testing availability, which was a big problem with COVID initially, that, so they're aware of that and working on that, and they are working with the federal government as well with regard to identifying who would most benefit from vaccination. It looks at this point as if it would be people who were identified as close contacts, very close contacts of a positive case for monkeypox.
