VIDEO | Smallpox of the monkeys, Vaia (Spallanzani): “Of the 3 hospitalized by us I return, 2 of from the Canaries”
ROME – “It is a situation to be noted, but there is currently no alarm“. The general director of Inmi Spallanzani immediately specified this, Francesco Vaia, opening the conference organized this morning in Rome to update on the situation of monkeypox in Italy. “The three people currently held at our hospital with confirmed Monkeypox virus infection are three young men who do not have two contacts with each other, even if two report a trip, where a case of this disease was recently reported. while the third reported a trip to Vienna“.
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“All three are inside fair health conditions – Vaia specified -, they have an enlargement of some lymphatic glands, which are painful, and the appearance of a limited number of small localized pustules. Only one presented a short-lived fever ”. As for the care, the general manager explained that patients “are treated with symptomatic therapy that is currently sufficient”. Vaia then specified that in any case at the Spallanzani Institute “gods are available antiviral drugs that could be used experimentally if specific therapy is required. At present this is not the case – she stressed – but we are ready to have these drugs available ”.
For next week the Spallanzani virology laboratory “plans to isolate the virus – Vaia anticipated – and this will make it possible carry out a series of experimental investigations. In particular it will be possible to study if in the blood of people who have been vaccinated against smallpox, people who are now over 50, there are present that neutralize this virus and immune cells capable of attacking it“. Viral isolation also “will allow tests for the serological diagnosis of this infection to be performed”.
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He was also keen to reassure Massimo Andreoniscientific director of the Italian Society of Infectious and Tropical Diseases who underlined how at the moment “we are in a situation of absolute tranquility, there are very few cases in the world – he said – so we must not trigger a mechanism of great need. There is attention “. Andreoni then confessed that “all the cases that have been in the literature have been self-limited, there have been no major epidemics“.
At the end of the conference, the Councilor for Health of the Lazio Region, Alessio D’Amatohe specified that “the situation is under controlthese cases were also identified thanks to a good surveillance system who is at work to reconstruct the contact tree, we hope that this work can be completed within hours ”, he concluded.
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