More people should be vaccinated against monkeypox

Published 23 August 2024 at 18.47

Domestic. Due to the spread of monkeypox, the Public Health Authority has updated which vaccination against the disease is recommended. Now more than gay men and the like are covered.

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The update of vaccination recommendations concerns those who will be traveling to a geographic area with ongoing community transmission of monkeypox (“mpox”), and who may be at particular risk of being exposed to infection.

– I want to emphasize that the vast majority of travelers do not need vaccination against mpox. With this update of the recommendations, we make it extra clear that it is a limited number of people at high risk who we see have the need, says Magnus Gisslén, state epidemiologist at the Public Health Agency.

Vaccination may, for example, be relevant for health care workers, aid workers or others who intend to stay in a geographical area with an ongoing spread of monkeypox in the community and who intend to have close physical contact with people in local communities where the infection control measures in the general travel recommendations do not are deemed to be sufficient.

Offering vaccination must always be preceded by an individual assessment by a doctor.

– The most important measure to protect against mpox if you are in an area with ongoing spread is to refrain from close physical contact, and above all new sexual contact, says Magnus Gisslén.

For other groups in society that have previously been recommended vaccination against monkeypox, there will be no changes with this update.

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The World Health Organization WHO has classified the spread of mpox clade 1 in the Democratic Republic of Congo and neighboring countries as an international threat to human health. The European infection control authority ECDC currently assesses the risk to the population in Sweden and the rest of Europe as low.