The Government on Saturday rejected reports that a girl has been found to be suffering from the monkeypox disease in Ghaziabad in Uttar Pradesh. However, it said that as a precautionary measures, the samples from the five-year-old girl have been sent for testing for monkeypox to ICMR NIV Pune.
UP Deputy CM and Health Minister Brajesh Pathak said that it is "unnecessary panic mongering" and that no cases of the disease have been reported from India so far."
According to reports, the girl complained of itching and rashes on her body. The Chief Medical Officer of Ghaziabad said the test was just a "precautionary measure" as the girl has no other health issues and did not have close contact with anyone who has travelled abroad in the past month."Samples of a five-year-old girl have been collected for testing for monkeypox, as a precautionary measure, as she had complaints of itching and rashes on her body. She has no other health issues and neither she nor any of her close contacts travelled abroad in the past month," CMO Ghaziabad said.
On Tuesday, the Union Health Ministry issued "Guidelines on Management of Monkeypox Disease" to ensure advance preparedness across the country, in view of the rising reports of monkeypox cases in non-endemic countries.According to the guidelines, a confirmed case is laboratory confirmed for Monkeypox virus by detection of unique sequences of viral DNA either by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) or sequencing.