The US government has declared the monkeypox outbreak a public health emergency after the recent surge in cases.
There are now more than 6,600 cases in the country, according to health officials, and that number is expected to continue to rise.
Fears that the disease could cause another pandemic first emerged in May 2022 when cases of the virus were detected in Europe, the United States and Canada.
It comes just weeks after the World Health Organization (WHO) declared monkeypox a global health emergency after a sharp rise in the number of cases.
The disease is caught from wild animals in West and Central Africa and is believed to be spread by rodents, such as rats and mice.
Usually, you get monkeypox when an infected animal bites you or you touch its body fluids, but it can spread through humans as well.
The infection usually begins with a high fever, headache and fatigue before large lesions appear on the skin.
Panic appears on Twitter, as people fear another global pandemic is looming. As always, many react to humorous memes and monkeypox.
Here are some of them…
Monkeypox memes are flooding Twitter
Monkeypox to Covid now:
If you see me walking around like this, don’t ask:
Awesome, just awesome:
Forget covid, monkeypox is here now:
here we go again:
It’s all down from here:
Can’t handle this:
Round two pandemic:
here we go again:
Monkeypox and the Covid virus dominated the rest of the 2000s:
Detecting monkeypox outbreaks such as:
There is a lot going on:
interesting:
Too much fear:
Me after I got monkeypox:
help:
How we all feel:
Things are about to get serious:
Overthinking every flaw:
Earth is doomed to fail:
Treating monkeypox with the smallpox vaccine
Many health organizations around the world have recommended that doctors distribute smallpox vaccines amid an outbreak of monkeypox.
The UK and many other countries have stocks of smallpox vaccines that are no longer used because children stopped being vaccinated against the disease in the UK in 1971.
By that time, the virus had been almost completely eradicated, so there was no need for routine large-scale vaccination of children anymore.
Smallpox and monkeypox are very similar, which leads to fever and rash, which means that smallpox vaccines are effective in protecting people from monkeypox.
“Because the monkeypox virus is closely related to the virus that causes smallpox, the smallpox vaccine can protect people from monkeypox,” the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said.
The World Health Organization has also revealed that smallpox vaccines are “85% effective in preventing monkeypox”.