I’m in regular contact with Public Health England and I’ll continue to monitor current events.

I’ve been assured by Public Health England that the risk of transmission of monkeypox is very low, but health professionals are unable to exclude the possibility of the virus being present in a patient’s home, if they were there when they became unwell.  As a precaution, over the next few days specialist teams will be cleaning the homes of patients with confirmed monkeypox and I’m told this will take some time to complete.

Health professionals have been closely monitoring the health of all those who came into contact with the patients with confirmed monkeypox. If they develop any symptoms (such as fever, headache, muscle aches, rash, backache, swollen glands, chills and exhaustion) then they’ve been given details on who and how to notify the Public Health England monitoring team who will arrange further evaluation. If you’d like to know more about the illness there’s further information on the NHS website (https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/monkeypox/).

I’d like to send my best wishes to those who’ve been affected and wish them a speedy recovery – and my thanks to the fantastic health care teams involved and Public Health England for keeping me informed of developments.