Of those surveyed, 99% of those infected are men and their average age is 38, the agency added after analyzing 336 of the 366 confirmed cases found in the UK since the epidemic began last month. The vast majority of cases – 99% – involve men who are gay, bisexual or have sex with other men, the UKHSA reported. Interviews with 45 men with smallpox especially for their sexual health found that 44% had visited “sex venues” in the UK or abroad, such as saunas, sex clubs and dark rooms, while incubating the infection. . In addition, 64% had met new sexual partners during the incubation period through an dating app. The incubation lasts between five and 21 days. Finding all the sexual partners of men infected with smallpox will be difficult, the UKHSA acknowledged, as “most cases reported having sex with young or casual partners… where contact information was not available for detection”. The UKHSA report is based on a close review of the history of 336 laboratory-confirmed cases detected in the UK as of 8 June, including detailed questionnaires that completed 152 cases. This total rose to 366 on Friday. “A large proportion of cases in England were known to be Londoners,” he said, adding that 224 of the 276 people for whom they had a home address lived in the capital. In terms of gender, 311 (99%) of the 314 confirmed cases were men, with three women. Their age was from 32 to 44 years. “The findings show that monkey pox is transmitted through geographically dispersed sexual networks,” the report added. Of the 45 respondents, 98% had sex with other men during the incubation period. In this group 60% had been diagnosed with a sexually transmitted infection during the previous year, 44% had had more than ten sexual partners in the previous three months and the same percentage had had group sex while the infection was incubating. “The sexual networks involved in this outbreak are interconnected both inside and outside the UK,” the UKHSA said. Among the 45 cases, 30% had sex in a city outside their usual place of residence, 20% had sex abroad and 24% had sex with non-UK men. Health officials hope sex sites will agree to implement ‘targeted interventions’ [which] would support epidemic control “to try to reduce the risk of further transmission of the monkey pox virus. The agency’s “early data and preliminary analyzes” also say that the number of cases detected so far means that the outbreak in England is currently at level 2 of the four levels. This is defined as “transmission within a defined subpopulation with a large number of close contacts”. However, as the numbers rise, officials are monitoring it for signs that it has reached level 3 – “transmission to many subpopulations or larger subpopulations”.
