The Ministry of Public Health confirmed this Saturday the third case of monkeypox in Cuba in a 27-year-old woman who is hospitalized, isolated and under medical follow-up.
The patient, a Cuban resident in the central province of Cienfuegos, is not related to the other two cases confirmed in August, reported the institution in a statement. Both were a 60-year-old Cuban resident in the United States and a 50-year-old Italian tourist, who died days after testing positive for the disease, according to the Cuban government.
Regarding this third case, the health authorities indicated that it was a contact of a Cuban citizen residing in the United States who had suspicious symptoms of the disease.
He “arrived in Cuba on September 3 of this year and returned on the 13th of the same month,” they added. The young woman diagnosed began with symptoms on September 15, she went to the doctor a week later and the next day they confirmed the infection.
“The established focus control actions and epidemiological surveillance are carried out,” said the Ministry of Health. “In relation to the contacts of the previously notified cases, they are already discharged, with no evidence of transmission of the disease in the focus controls carried out,” the source added.
The young woman diagnosed began with symptoms on September 15, went to the doctor a week later and the next day they confirmed the infection
The World Health Organization (WHO) declared this disease – also called monkeypox – as a “global health emergency” on July 23, when more than 16,000 infections had been reported in 75 countries.
The disease is caused by a virus and can be transmitted from animals to humans or by direct contact with people who have symptoms, according to specialists.
The WHO reports that symptoms include fever, headache, muscle aches, low energy, swollen lymph nodes, and rashes or skin lesions.
Sick people can infect other people while they have symptoms and the virus is transmitted through body fluids (pus or blood from skin lesions), scabs and objects used by sick people.
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