Pakistan’s third case of the mpox virus was confirmed at the Peshawar airport while another suspected patient was also shifted to a hospital, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Public Health Director Dr Irshad Ali Roghani said on Saturday.
Earlier this month, the World Health Organisation (WHO) declared the recent outbreak of the disease as a public health emergency of international concern after the new variant of the virus, Clade 1b, was identified.
The Clade 1b variant has triggered global concern due to the ease with which it spreads through routine close contact.
However, the mpox outbreak is not another Covid-19, the WHO has said, because much is already known about the virus and the means to control it.
The health ministry had clarified earlier that the first mpox case detected in Pakistan was of the clade 2 variety. A second case of mpox was confirmed last week, with the patient also detected at the Peshawar airport.
Medical personnel at Bacha Khan International Airport identified two travellers displaying symptoms of the mpox virus (previously monkeypox) on Thursday, the KP public health director said.
The patients were then transferred to the Police and Services Hospital (PSH) for immediate treatment, Dr Roghani added.
According to documents seen by Dawn.com, including the ‘Suspected Passengers Data Form’ for each person, both passengers were aboard the same flight from Jeddah to Peshawar.
The KP health official said the confirmed case was of a 51-year-old man hailing from Orakzai, who was in stable condition and undergoing treatment at the PSH.
“This is the third confirmed case of mpox in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in the year 2024,” Dr Roghani said, adding that no locally transmitted cases had been recorded so far.
“The Rapid Response Team took the patient’s samples and sent them to the laboratory,” he said, following which the Public Health Reference Laboratory confirmed that the patient had mpox.
Meanwhile, samples from the second patient, a 47-year-old man from Peshawar, were also sent to the laboratory for tests and awaited results, Dr Roghani said.
The KP Health Department has created an integrated surveillance and response system for mpox, the official added.
Pakistan confirmed the second case of mpox last week, with the national health coordinator stating that the patient was detected at the Peshawar airport.
Meanwhile, the Ministry of National Health Services has said that the mpox virus was under control in Pakistan.
A ministry spokesperson claimed that screening of suspected patients was under way across the country and those showing symptoms were being sent to isolation wards in hospitals to avoid local transmission of the virus.
The WHO sounded its highest level of alert over the outbreak in Africa after cases in the Democratic Republic of Congo spread to nearby countries. There have been 27,000 cases and more than 1,100 deaths, mainly among children, in DRC since the current outbreak began in January 2023.
One case each of the clade 1b variant has been confirmed in Sweden and Thailand so far — the first signs of its spread outside the continent. However, the WHO has not urged any travel restrictions to curb the spread of mpox.
The disease presents with flu-like symptoms and pus-filled lesions. It is usually mild but can kill, and children, pregnant women, and people with weakened immune systems are at higher risk of complications.
