The province’s first confirmed case of the virus, announced last Friday, had not traveled from New Brunswick, said Dr. Yves Lazer, deputy chief medical director of health. That “reasonably” means the person got the virus from either a New Brunswick resident or someone traveling to the province, Léger said in an interview Tuesday with Shift. To limit the spread of the virus, Public Health is following the contacts of the case and trying to find the possible source of the infection. “We’re also looking back to try to see where the contamination may have been contracted from the case,” Léger said. Dr. Yves Léger, deputy chief medical officer of health, said it is “concerning” that the first confirmed case in New Brunswick was exposed to the virus in the province. (Pascal Raiche-Nogue/Radio-Canada) New Brunswick has been given 140 doses of the monkeypox vaccine, which are being held to manage close contacts of any identified cases of the virus. Since the initial batch, some doses have been offered to some contacts of the confirmed case, Léger said.
Léger said Public Health is in discussions with the federal government to achieve a “significant increase” in the supply of vaccines. Public Health would then like to make it available to high-risk groups to try to prevent more cases. Léger said the virus is spread from one infected person to another when they are in close or direct contact. However, monkeypox “does not spread as easily from one person to another” as SARS-CoV-2. So the risk to the general public remains low, he said. “Those at highest risk of infection are usually either household contacts of people living with the case, sharing space regularly for long hours, coming into contact with the same environments, for example, or being intimate sexual partners.” After exposure, symptoms usually tend to appear in six to 21 days.
Early symptoms, called precursors and appearing before the chicken pox rash, include: A few days later, a rash appears after the fever. The rash often starts on the face, but can affect other parts of the body, such as the hands, feet, mouth and genitals. The rash usually starts as flattened reddish spots and changes to raised bumps that may have fluid inside. “That typical picture from start to finish can take, you know, between two to four weeks between when the first symptoms appear and the rash is completely gone and healed,” Léger said. Public Health hopes to see a significant increase in smallpox vaccines, Léger says. (Christine Muschi/Reuters) However, evolution does not always happen in the same way. “Sometimes the rash is the first thing that appears before other symptoms, and sometimes the rash spreads all over the body,” Léger said. The person infected with monkeypox is recovering well, he said. “At this time, Public Health continues to monitor their condition very closely.”