Sweden has recorded its first case of the disease in Europe more dangerous variant of mpox which is spreading rapidly in Africa, after the WHO declared a global public health emergency.
“We have now […] “It has been confirmed that we have one case of the more severe type of mpox in Sweden, the variant called Clade I,” Health and Social Affairs Minister Jakob Forssmed told a news conference on Thursday.
The Swedish Public Health Agency reported: “It is the first case caused by clade I identified outside the African continent.”
The announcement came after the World Health Organization on Wednesday declared mpox a global public health emergency for the second time in two years, following an outbreak of clade 1 in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) that spread quickly to neighboring countries.
Clade 1 is likely to be associated with “a higher increase in more severe disease progression and higher mortality,” according to the Swedish Public Health Agency.
The patient contracted the virus while visiting “the part of Africa where there is a large outbreak of mpox clade I,” said Magnus Gisslen, a state epidemiologist.
The patient “has been receiving care,” he said, without providing further details about the person's condition.
The public health agency said Sweden is “prepared to safely diagnose, isolate and treat people with mpox”.
“The fact that a patient with mpox is being treated in the country does not affect the risk to the general population, a risk that the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) currently considers to be very low,” the report said.
Mpox is mainly spread through close contact, such as sex, skin-to-skin contact, and talking or breathing in close proximity to another person.
It causes a characteristic bumpy rash with pus-filled lesions, fever, pain and discomfort. It has also been linked to dangerous complications for pregnant women, including miscarriage.
There are two main types of mpox, known as clade 1 and clade 2. Clade 2 caused a public health emergency in 2022, but was relatively mild and has already emerged in Sweden and more than 100 other countries.
Clade 1b, a mutant strain of clade 1, appeared last September in a small mining town in the DRC and is considered “the most dangerous yet”.
Mortality rates in clade 2 are believed to be higher, between 5 and 10 percent, compared to 0.2 percent in clade 2.