As Monkeypox Rises, Smallpox Vaccines to Be Offered

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http://www.nytimes.com/2003/06/11/national/11POX.html?tntemail0= & pagewanted=print & position=June 11, 2003As Monkeypox Rises, Smallpox Vaccines to Be OfferedBy LAWRENCE K. ALTMANederal health officials are expected to announce today that smallpoxvaccinations will be made available to certain people who have been exposedto prairie dogs and other animals infected with monkeypox in recent days.Smallpox vaccine is considered the most dangerous of human immunizations,but it can protect against monkeypox.The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is expected to make thevaccinations available as an option to highly selected groups like healthworkers who care for patients with monkeypox, people who have been exposedto animals sick with monkeypox, veterinarians who care for animals suspectedof having it and scientists investigating monkeypox.The investigation of human monkeypox cases expanded to a fourth state,northern New Jersey, yesterday as the number of suspected monkeypox casesrose to 50: 23 in Indiana, 20 in Wisconsin, 6 in Illinois and 1 in NewJersey. No one has died.The total is more than double the 23 cases reported in three states when thedisease centers urgently announced the outbreak over the weekend. Theincrease in cases under investigation has resulted largely from widespreadpublicity that led people to report rashes and illness to health officials,officials of the centers in Atlanta said.The monkeypox cases are the first detected in the Americas. Most suspectedcases had direct contact with prairie dogs or at work in veterinarianoffices and pet shops.Monkeypox patients typically fall ill with signs and symptoms like fever,headaches, dry cough, swollen lymph nodes, chills and drenching sweats.One to 10 days later, patients develop rashes consisting of blisterlikepimples that filled with pus, broke open and produced scabs.The rash often erupts in different stages, or crops, as it appeared on thehead, trunk and arms and legs.The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is also expected today toannounce a definition of human monkeypox, which would be critical indetermining who would be eligible for smallpox vaccinations as well asinvestigating the outbreak.United States officials stopped routine smallpox vaccinations in 1970, abouta decade before eradication of smallpox from the world.On Monday, a subgroup of a national panel of immunization experts appointedby the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to serve on its AdvisoryCommittee on Immunization Practices began discussions on whether and how thesmallpox vaccine might be used.Discussions focused on the benefits and risks of smallpox vaccine formonkeypox, a viral disease that can be fatal in 10 percent of human cases.The death rate for smallpox was about 30 percent.But smallpox vaccination can also be fatal. Studies from the 1960's, whensmallpox vaccinations were routine, found that for every million peopleolder than 1 year old who were vaccinated, 1 or 2 died, 9 suffered frombrain infection and more than 100 developed eczema vaccinatum, a severeillness and skin rash that can leave deep scars and can occasionally belife-threatening.The government owns all the smallpox vaccine in the United States. Thisyear, the government began offering it to health care workers to protectagainst any cases that might result from an attack in which terroristsreleased the virus.The only known stocks of smallpox virus are kept at the Centers for DiseaseControl and Prevention and in Russia, both with the approval of the WorldHealth Organization.But the Bush administration has warned that Iraq as well as other countriesand rogue groups might have obtained smallpox virus from the official storesin Russia and begun a program to vaccinate health care workers before thewar began against Iraq.The number of people for whom smallpox vaccine might be offered to protectagainst monkeypox would be small, the panel's chairman, Dr. John F. Modlin,said in an interview before the panel's meeting.Be At Peace,Deborah A DelpMother to:Samantha (8, ADHD/ODD)JR (5, ASD)What we do with our lives depends on ourMotivation to do something with our lives.D.A.DelpI hope there is a special place in HeavenFor any child whose life here on Earth was HellAnd a special place in Hell for those who made it so!!!K. BlancoWebsite:www.delpshopepage.orgInformational Groupautism_and_vaccinations