This festive bridge with varied programming in some cities of Colombia could generate increased circulation of monkeypox, warned this Thursday the Minister of Health, Carolina Corcho.
It is worth remembering that these are events such as the Flower Fair in Medellín, the Petronio Álvarez Festival in Cali, the Summer Festival in Bogotá and the one with kites for the 483 years of Tunja, with a large number of people.
The senior official also referred to the fact that the cases of diagnosed people continue to increase and that the figure until this Thursday is 84 cases across the country.
He explained that the transmission of the virus depends on people being exposed to circumstances in which they establish close physical contact, which implies coming into contact with secretions and body fluids of an infected person in two possible ways:
– Directly, such as kissing, hugging, licking, having face-to-face contact, generalized skin-to-skin caresses or touching and rubbing the patient’s lesions.
– Indirectly, when personal items are touched or shared such as: cell phones, clothes, sheets, vapers, cigarettes, glasses, drinks, towels, cutlery, brushes and any other element or surface that may have been in contact with the skin lesions of a sick person.
For all of the above, the Ministry of Health reiterated the call to take extreme self-care measures to avoid contagion and adopt permanent measures such as frequent hand washing and the use of face masks.
He recalled that monkeypox is not a sexually transmitted disease, nor is it exclusive to a population group. Which means that the use of condoms is not enough to prevent the spread of the disease. “Sexual intercourse creates the ideal circumstances for transmission to occur,” she noted.
This virus can be acquired by a healthy person in two ways: because it absorbs fluids in small drops through the respiratory tract; or because the virus that is in the fluids that came into contact with the skin has the ability to cross healthy skin. Therefore, it can be contracted by a person of any age.
The person who suspects they have the disease or is a close contact of a case must go to the health services to be diagnosed by means of a laboratory test.
About Covid-19, it was reported that the virus continues to circulate in Colombia and that its transmission is easier than before, due to new mutations.
It was also noted that although mortality and ICU hospitalization have decreased Notoriously thanks to vaccines, there are municipalities with low vaccination coverage that maintain a large number of vulnerable populations.
In other cases, there are municipalities with high coverage in which there are still people who have refused to be vaccinated, thus maintaining active transmission and the risk for the most vulnerable.