Monkeypox may present a greater risk for children, especially those under eight years of age, said Marco Aurélio Sáfadi, an infectious disease specialist and president of the Department of Infectious Diseases of the Brazilian Society of Pediatrics (SBP), in an interview with CNN this Friday (29).
“Of the more than 21,000 cases, less than a hundred are reported in children. However, what is known is that children are indeed a vulnerable group, a group that is more fragile to the complications of the disease”, he said.
According to Sáfadi, “what is known, in general, is that monkeypox has a higher risk of a serious outcome in immunocompromised individuals, and in young children, below six, eight years of age,” he continued.
The infectologist explains, however, that the evolution “has been good”, but that it is still necessary to understand the behavior of the infection in this group.
On Thursday (28), the Municipal Health Department of São Paulo recorded three cases of monkeypox in children in the capital.
All are being monitored and show no signs of worsening of the disease.
Until Thursday (28), Brazil had registered 1,066 cases of the disease – it was not informed whether the cases of children in São Paulo are included. The data were released by the Ministry of Health, which started to use the term “outbreak” to refer to smallpox in monkeys.
According to the pediatrician, even though the group most affected is gay men, in their 30s, taking into account the transmission mechanisms, “it is to be assumed that, as the disease progresses, we begin to observe a number more cases in other groups — such as children,” said Sáfadi.
Monkeypox is a disease transmitted primarily by intimate contact and exchange of secretions between people.
This means: hugging, kissing, sexual contact, sharing personal hygiene items, cutlery, etc. In addition, the virus also spreads through the respiratory tract, but this situation is less common than the first one. In most cases, the infection is not lethal, but it can be more severe in people with comorbidities.
Source: CNN Brasil
