Monkeypox can spread before symptoms appear, British researchers said on Wednesday, providing the first evidence indicating the virus can be transmitted this way.
It was previously thought that monkeypox was almost entirely spread by people who were already sick, although pre-symptomatic transmission had not been ruled out and some routine screening had picked up cases without symptoms.
Monkeypox, a relatively mild viral illness that is endemic in several countries in western and central Africa, exploded around the world earlier this year, with outbreaks in dozens of countries where it had never previously appeared.
There have been almost 78,000 confirmed cases and 36 deaths since, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Although cases have peaked in many countries, this week the World Health Organization said the outbreak still represented a global health emergency.
The virus is known to spread through close contact and causes symptoms including fever, body aches and often painful pus-filled skin lesions.
To find out more about how monkeypox was transmitting in Britain, a team from the UK Health Security Agency used routine surveillance and contact tracing data for 2,746 people in the country who tested positive between May and August.
Their average age was 38, and 95% of the patients reported being gay, bisexual or men who have sex with men.
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