Union Health Minister J.P. Nadda chaired a meeting on Saturday to review the Monkeypox situation and preparedness in India in the wake of the World Health Organisation (WHO) declaring the viral illness a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC).
Officials from the health ministry, National Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) and Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) attended the meeting.
According to an official statement, it was decided at the meeting that certain measures (such as sensitizing the health units at all the airports, seaports, and ground crossings; readying the testing laboratories; gearing up health facilities for detecting, isolating and managing any case, etc.) need to be put in place.
“In the meeting, it was noted that Monkeypox infections are usually self-limiting lasting between 2-4 weeks and patients generally recover with supportive management,” the statement issued by the health ministry said.
The transmission requires prolonged close contact with an infected case and is generally through the sexual route, direct contact with body/lesion fluid, or contaminated clothing/linen of an infected person, it added.
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The health ministry is closely monitoring the situation even though India has not reported any case of late. The last case of Monkeypox in the country was reported from Kerala in March this year.
Officials do not entirely rule out the possibility of a few imported cases being detected in the coming weeks. However, it was assessed that the infection is very low in India at the moment and there is no need to panic.
This is the second time the WHO has declared Monkeypox as PHEIC. According to the world health body, common symptoms of Monkeypox are a skin rash or mucosal lesions which can last 2–4 weeks accompanied by fever, headache, muscle aches, back pain, low energy, and swollen lymph nodes.
Laboratory confirmation of Monkeypox is done by testing skin lesion material by PCR.