North Texas public health officials are finding cases of local transmission in the ongoing monkeypox outbreak.
A press release issued on Tuesday by Dallas County Health and Human Services (DCHHS) stated that the county had at least 14 confirmed cases of monkeypox, one of which was contracted by a person attending the Daddyland Festival over the July 4 weekend.
“The threat of monkeypox to the general Dallas County population remains low,” stated the release. “Monkeypox is rare and does not spread easily between people without close, personal, skin–to–skin contact.”
For its part, Tarrant County Public Health (TCPH) reported its second confirmed case of monkeypox on Wednesday. It told CBS News that the second case had to result from exposure in the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex, as the infected individual had no travel history during the virus’s incubation period.
Denton County reported its first case last week, also contracted by someone without a recent travel history.
Texas currently stands as the state with the seventh greatest number of confirmed monkeypox cases in the country, clocking 42 as of Wednesday, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), out of a total of 1,470 cases spread out across the United States.
Monkeypox is a rare disease transmitted through contact with an infected person’s bodily fluids and skin lesions or by sharing personal items such as the clothes, towels, or bedding of an infected person.
While the virus is not considered especially transmissible, it can be spread through respiratory droplets produced by coughing and sneezing. However, prolonged exposure in the close vicinity of an infected person is usually required for transmission.
Following a non-contagious incubation period of one to two weeks, individuals infected with monkeypox may initially show symptoms like body pains, fever, and swollen lymph nodes before finally developing skin lesions.
As reported by The Dallas Express, monkeypox is primarily spreading within sexual networks of men who have sex with men. However, anyone engaging in prolonged skin-to-skin contact with an infected person can contract monkeypox, according to the CDC.
