AS MPOX VIRAL INFECTIONS IN MINDANAO RISE

TheMindanaoToday.com | AS MPOX VIRAL INFECTIONS IN MINDANAO RISE

By: Uriel Quilinguing

CAGAYAN DE ORO, Philippines – The public must observe minimum public health standards (MPHS), including wearing of mask, due to spike of confirmed mpox (formerly monkey pox) infections in Mindanao.

As of May 28 this year, 17 mpox cases have been confirmed in five provinces within a week, less than a month after the health office in Davao City reported of two infections, including one who died.

“There is no mpox case in Cagayan de Oro and Northern Mindanao,” City Health Officer Dr. Rachel Dilla said in an audio-video recording posted online, two days after requiring all personnel to put on masks.

As of May 27, places in Mindanao with mpox confirmed cases are: South Cotabato 10, Sultan Kudarat 3, Maguindanao del Norte 2, Davao City 2, and one each in North Cotabato, Davao del Sur, and Zamboanga Sibugay. Iloilo City in the Visayas also reported a confirmed mpox case.

The wearing of mask as directed under Memorandum No. 139-20025 was for personnel of the City Health Office and its health centers, yet all who enter these facilities are also required to do the same.

Dilla said the mpox (Orthopoxvirus) can easily spread because it takes only hours for people to travel by land in Mindanao, including to and from places where mpox has been detected.

In less than 24 hours, Dilla’s memorandum was shared online and face mask became a hot item once again in pharmacies and convenience stores in this city, reminiscent of the Covid-19 pandemic.

The health offices of Lanao del Norte province, Misamis Oriental’s Manticao and Naawan towns and Bukidnon’s Maramag and Manolo Fortich followed suit with the issuance of public advisories on the wearing of face masks and observance of MPHS.

Aside from masks, MPHS includes frequent hand-washing with soap, use of alcohol and hand-sanitizers, distancing, and avoidance of congested rooms.

Dilla said that although mpox virus originated from monkeys, it has found reservoir in other animals that are often in close contact with humans such as dogs, cats, pigs, horses among others. Human-to-human transmission is by close contact, skin-to-skin including sex, kissing, and touching, she added.

She said that once a person is infected, symptoms may not surface at once as clinical studies the virus may survive in the human body for 21 days. Fever, intense headache, loss of energy, body pains and in joints, and skin rashes that become lesions.

There is vaccine for mpox but is not available in the Philippines, hence she advised those with flu-like symptoms to voluntarily have themselves checked in health centers for proper management. [Uriel Quilinguing/MT]

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