The Conselleria de Salud y Consumo confirms the first case of monkeypox in the Balearic Islands on the island of Formentera. The case is a 42-year-old Italian tourist residing in the United Kingdom, who is in good health.
The patient was treated at the Formentera Hospital last Friday for skin lesions, for which he underwent a microbiological test that determined a positive case of the monkeypox disease.
The patient, who until now was staying in a hotel in Formentera, will remain in the hospital for close monitoring and to ensure his isolation until the end of the regulatory period.
For its part, the General Directorate of Public Health, following the protocols of the Ministry of Health, has initiated the survey of possible close contacts. So far, only his partner has been determined a close contact, who has no compatible symptomatology and will only need to remain under surveillance.
First case of monkeypox in the Balearic Islands
The case detected on Formentera is the first on the islands, but in recent days positives cases have continued to appear in the various autonomous communities.
The Carlos III Health Institute had confirmed until Monday 198 cases of monkeypox in Spain, twelve more after the weekend, as reported by the Ministry of Health, but yesterday exceeded 200. In the Community of Madrid, with the highest concentration of cases in the country, 27 more positives were confirmed yesterday, bringing the figure to 210 in that territory.
The Ministry of Health indicated that, until Monday, the laboratories of the Carlos III Institute have received samples belonging to 402 suspected cases of monkeypox, of which 198 were positive and 204 others were discarded by showing a negative result for human smallpox and for other orthopoxviruses.
Hospitals in the autonomous communities began last week to perform PCR tests for the detection of monkeypox virus, a diagnosis made possible because the Carlos III Health Institute obtained the first draft of the complete monkeypox virus sequence from samples of 23 infected patients.
Thus, communities such as Madrid, with the highest number of cases in Spain, already perform these tests in four Microbiology laboratories of the hospitals of La Paz, Doce de Octubre, Ramón y Cajal and Gregorio Marañón, in addition to the Regional Public Health Laboratory of the Hospital de Emergencias Enfermera Isabel Zendal.
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