After the first case of the new variant in France, the Ministry of Health renews its advice

HEALTH – Vaccination and barrier gestures. On the arrival of a new variant of mpox in France, the contraction of “monkey pox” in English, previously called “ monkeypox », the Ministry of Health called for vigilance and gave, this Tuesday, January 7, advice so that the most vulnerable populations protect themselves.

The first of these remains vaccination, in particular for “ target audiences » : « Vaccination is recommended as a preventive measure in pre-exposure for people at high risk of exposure, and as a reactive measure for contact persons at risk around a case of mpox », recalls the ministry, with a link to the contact details of the vaccination centers against the virus.

The question arose of expanding preventive vaccination, but the French authorities did not make this choice and the campaign remains focused on the profiles of people “ at high risk of exposure »: homosexual men, prostitutes – men or women – and any person working in places dedicated to sexual encounters. Logically, vaccination also targets anyone who has recently been in contact with a reported case of “ mpox ».

The detection of the variant in France is not a surprise for the health authorities, who had been preparing for it for months. Several vaccines, originally developed against smallpox, are effective against ” mpox “. It remains to be clarified to what extent this effectiveness continues in the face of this new variant, but for the moment, the experts are rather confident. For travelers coming from or going to Central Africa, it is recommended to apply classic barrier gestures.

The new variant detected in Brittany

On the evening of Monday January 6, health authorities announced that they had detected for the first time in France a version of the virus which differs from the one previously circulating in the territory. We are talking about « clade » to designate the different families of the virus “ mpox “. Since 2022, clade 2 has been circulating in France, as in most countries where the disease has been detected outside Africa.

This time, it is a variant of the other large family, clade 1, which was spotted in a patient in Brittany. Added to this is another subtlety. This is not the classic clade 1, present for decades in Africa, but a variant, clade 1b, much more recently identified in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). This is why we are talking about a new variant.

There is currently no indication that this version of the virus, which manifests itself mainly by fever and the appearance of skin lesions, known as blisters, would be more dangerous than the one that has been circulating for years in France. However, its appearance requires increased vigilance, because many elements on its profile are still unknown.

Its degree of contagiousness remains to be decided, even if it has not yet given rise to new outbreaks in the European countries where it has been identified: Germany, Belgium, the United Kingdom. and Sweden. These were generally people who had just returned from Central Africa and had therefore been contaminated on site. In the French case, on the other hand, the patient – who is doing well – had been in contact with relatives who had traveled to the countries concerned.

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