Boston public schools reports first monkeypox case
Boston public schools (BPS) yesterday announced the first monkeypox case in an "adult member of the BPS community," according to a letter sent to parents. The school district said the person was isolating at home, and the district was working to identify exposed individuals.
Also yesterday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported 394 more monkeypox cases, raising the national total to 23,893. Currently fewer than 25 cases in the country have been in children.
The CDC maintains that the risk of monkeypox exposures in a school setting is low.
A new meta analysis published in the European Journal of Internal Medicine shows that, across 14 studies conducted during the current outbreak, the prevalence of monkeypox cases involving men was 99.9%, and 98.7% of cases were in men who have sex with men. A total of 37.9% of monkeypox patients also had HIV, and 22.1% had another concurrent sexually transmitted infection at the time of monkeypox diagnosis.
In other news, Virax Biolabs, a London-based diagnostics company, launched a new rapid test kit for monkeypox detection to be used at point-of-care sites in the European Union. The swabs, which can be used in the throat or on lesions, can detect an infection within 15 minutes.
Also today, Bavarian Nordic, maker of the Jynneos vaccine, announced a new 10-year contract valued at $434 million for the supply of both smallpox and monkeypox vaccines to Canada.
Sep 19 Boston Herald story
Sep 19 CDC update
Sep 17 Eur J Intern Med study
Sep 20 Virax press release
Sep 20 Bavarian Nordic press release
Using Tamiflu in hospitalized children tied to shorter stay for flu
A study across 36 US pediatric tertiary hospitals finds that early use of the antiviral oseltamivir (Tamiflu) in hospitalized children was associated with a shorter hospital stay, lower odds of 7-day readmission, and lower rates of severe outcomes. The study was published yesterday in JAMA Pediatrics.
Included in the retrospective cohort study were 55,799 encounters for pediatric influenza, with the median age of patients being 3.6 years. Of the patients, 56% were boys and 44% were girls. Patient encounters from Oct 1, 2007, to Mar 31, 2020, were included.
Early exposure to oseltamivir was defined as administration within 24 hours after hospital admission. Main outcomes measures were length of hospital stay, readmission, intensive care unit (ICU) transfer, and death.
A total of 3,207 patients (59.5%) received early oseltamivir. Children in this group had lower median length of stay (LOS; 3 days compared with 4 days), a lower 7-day readmission rate (3.5% vs 4.8%), late ICU transfer (2.4% vs 5.4%), and lower in-hospital mortality (0.9% vs 1.3%) compared with children not treated with early oseltamivir.
High-risk patient subgroups and lower-risk subgroups benefitted equally from early oseltamivir administration, the authors said.
"The reduction in length of illness seems to apply to severe illness in addition to mild illness and is independent of where care is delivered. In fact, the group with the largest reduction in LOS in our study were the patients initially admitted to the ICU," the authors concluded.
Sep 19 JAMA Pediatr study
