Treating Monkeypox With Antiviral Drugs Might be Effective

Monkeypox – A New Challenge To The World

The cases observed were challenging and resource-intensive to manage, even in the high-income setting of the UK. With international travel returning to pre-pandemic levels, public health officials and healthcare workers around the world must remain vigilant to the possibility of new cases of monkeypox.

Until now, monkeypox has been a rare, imported condition in the UK and the NHS High Consequence Infectious Diseases Network has treated all seven of the UK’s confirmed cases until 2021.

Outbreaks outside of Africa are unusual but in recent days, significant outbreaks have been reported in several European countries, including the UK, and further afield globally.

Clinical trial data is lacking and we are pleased to share some of our collective experience in managing this previously rare and sporadic condition.

There are currently no licensed treatments for monkeypox and there is limited data on the duration of its contagiousness, with the incubation period ranging from five to 21 days. Patients typically stay in isolation in a specialty hospital to prevent spreading the virus to others.

The first human case of monkeypox was reported in 1970 in the Democratic Republic of the Congo [3] and rarely occurs outside central and western African countries. To date, there has been little research into cases of monkeypox in high-income countries.

Finding The Potential Treatment For Monkeypox

Of the seven UK monkeypox cases analyzed in this study, four were imported from West Africa with three further cases occurring due to human-to-human transmission within the case clusters.

Researchers observed clinical data alongside laboratory results from blood tests and nose-and-throat swabs to describe the duration and clinical features of monkeypox in a high-income setting.

They also reported patient response to antiviral medications developed to treat smallpox – brincidofovir and tecovirimat, which have previously demonstrated some efficacy against monkeypox in animals.

The initial three patients were treated with brincidofovir seven days after the initial onset of the rash. Brincidofovir was not observed to have any convincing clinical benefit in treating monkeypox and alterations in liver blood tests were observed.

Researchers note that it is not known whether brincidofovir administration earlier in the course of the disease or at a different dosing schedule would have yielded different clinical outcomes. Despite this, all three patients, plus the fourth hospital transmission patient, made a full recovery.

One of the 2021 UK patients was treated with tecovirimat and experienced a shorter duration of symptoms and upper respiratory tract viral shedding than the other cases in this cluster.

However, the conclusions are unable to be drawn on antiviral effectiveness against monkeypox in such a small population, calling for further research into antivirals to treat this neglected tropical disease.

Source: Medindia