Senior Research Fellow at the Noguchi Medical Research Institute, Dr Kwadwo Asamoah Kusi, has indicated that bush meat hunters have a higher risk of acquiring the monkeypox virus.
According to him, the monkeypox virus, which is mostly found in animals, belongs to the same virus family as the small box virus.However, the fatality rate of the monkey virus can be noted at 3% less deadly than small pox.
“The money pox is obviously a disease associated with monkeys but very similar to the small pox in humans. Lots of these viruses like the Ebola and others are from animals. Therefore, in an area were humans and animals interact more has the highest possibility of contracting these viruses. With the grass cutters and other bush meat Ghanaians enjoy, the individual who comes into contact with the live animal or freshly dead animal has a much higher risk of infection than the consumers,” he told Samuel Eshun on the Happy Morning Show.
The medical researcher shared that the virus spreads through direct body contact with an infected person and there is currently no cure for the virus. However, there are some vaccines that can be used to prevent others from contracting the virus.
He advised that Ghanaians observe proper hygiene protocols to minimise the spread of the monkeypox virus and also visit the veterinary services with their pets for monitoring and vaccines.
“It spreads through body contact so if we can adhere to proper hygiene like washing our hands and stuff it will be very difficult for people to be affected than the Covid-19. Most of these rodents get the virus because of something called the interactions in nature. These viruses are already in the environment in search of hosts to live in. Animals like bats have a lot of these viruses and that is why they are known as the reservoir of viruses. They have lived with viruses for a very long time and now cannot be endangered. So they just live on these animals until they get into contact with other hosts and then mutate to cause diseases,” he added.
Monkeypox is an endemic with a high rate of recorded cases in countries such as Benin, Cameroon, the Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Gabon, Ivory Coast, Liberia, Nigeria, the Republic of the Congo, Sierra Leone, and South Sudan.
On Wednesday, June 8, the Director-General of the Ghana Health Service, Dr Patrick Kuma-Aboagye disclosed that five(5) cases of monkeypox have been confirmed in the Eastern, Bono and Greater Accra regions. One of the cases was recorded in a Ghanaian who travelled to the United States of America from Ghana.
According to Dr Patrick Kuma-Aboagye, the cases were identified through the testing of 12 suspected cases, including one case that was reported from the Western Region.
