Monkeypox alert: Centre holds high-level meeting

The Central government on Sunday held a high-level meeting after a 34-year-old man from Delhi tested positive for the monkeypox virus. The man who has tested positive for the virus has no history of foreign travel. With the fresh monkeypox case in Delhi, the tally of those infected with the virus in India has climbed to four.
Sources told PTI that the review meeting was chaired by Directorate General of Health Sciences and attended by officials from the Health ministry, National Centre for Disease Control and ICMR among others.
The new patient to have tested positive for the monkeypox virus is presently recovering at a designated isolation centre at the Lok Nayak Hospital. According to reports, the 34-year-old had attended a stag party in Manali in Himachal Pradesh recently.
A doctor at the hospital said that the patient came with a fever and had rashes on his body.
His samples were sent to the National Institute of Virology (NIV) Pune on Saturday which came out positive, Health Ministry officials said.
The health ministry also said that the close contacts of the man who has tested positive for the monkeypox virus have been identified and are under quarantine.
Sources have told news agency ANI that states and UTs have been advised for close surveillance on the monkeypox cases in India.
The Delhi government has been advised for contact tracing of the monkeypox case. Three cases of monkeypox had earlier been reported from Kerala.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) on Saturday declared monkeypox a global public health emergency of international concern.