The Ministry of General public Health will not however declare monkeypox the “serious communicable disease” under Thailand’s 2015 Communicable Disease Function but it will boost screenings for the disease.
In spite of rejecting a suggestion to heighten the alert, the ministry’s committee, comprising medical and health experts, approved the ministry’s prompt a reaction to the current worldwide distribute of the viral illness, said Dr Chakrarat Pittayawonganon, director of the Bureau of Epidemiology. He made the particular remarks after the committee met on Tuesday.
The ministry announced this past weekend that it would raise surveillance measures regarding monkeypox after the 1st case was recognized in Thailand — a Nigerian man who later fled to Cambodia in which he was apprehended.
The panel has advised the ministry to further increase its monkeypox screening measures to cover every groups of international landings, not only those through certain countries exactly where cases of monkeypox have been reported, Doctor Chakrarat said.
Monkeypox does not fit the definition of the serious communicable disease under the 2015 law because it is not virulent or highly contagious, while the country’s healthcare system is capable of handling sufferers infected with the condition, he added.
The panel has assigned the Department of Healthcare Services to draft and issue suggestions for monkeypox treatment, and communicate these to all healthcare workers, he noted.
Unlike the virus that causes Covid-19, monkeypox has not mutated and it is normally transmitted by close contact with body fluids or lesions. Even though it can be passed to others through respiratory droplets, it is not an airborne disease, Dr Chakrarat said.
Thailand has effective treatments but they are prohibitively costly, he said.
In most cases, monkeypox is transmitted by means of sexual activity, making it challenging to contain many impossible to eradicate, similar to other physically transmitted diseases, stated Yong Poovorawan, chief of the Centre of Excellence in Clinical Virology at the Department of Paediatrics of Chulalongkorn University’s Faculty of Medicine.