Newshour - Monkeypox infections an 'unprecedented outbreak' - BBC Sounds

Monkeypox is a rare viral infection most common in remote parts of Central and West Africa. The disease, first found in monkeys, does not tend to spread easily between people but can be transmitted through close physical contact, including sexual intercourse. Cases of monkepox have been identified across Europe, UK, the US, Canada, Israel, and Australia.

Symptoms, which include a high temperature, aches, and a rash of raised spots that later turn into blisters, are typically mild and for most people clear up within two to four weeks.

Dr Charlotte Hammer, an infectious disease epidemiologist and researcher with Cambridge University in the UK, says that so far there have only been sporadic outbreaks outside Africa, and although this is an unprecedented outbreak, infection "requires very close physical contact - you need to be in contact with bodily fluids, and the lesions that people develop when they are infected."