Sweden allows for restrictions to stop monkeypox

Here we go again…

UPDATE 18:16, 22 May 2022: Swedish health authorities are now talking about possible restrictions because of the monkeypox outbreak, this is following Sweden declaring the disease as a “disease dangerous to public health”. One restriction that is being talked about is banning people suspected of infection from sexual activities while they are contagious, however they say that they do not think more widespread restrictions will happen.

Just a few months ago, Sweden removed all restrictions related to covid.

Now, after outbreaks of monkeypox across Europe, including a confirmed case in Sweden, the Swedish government has decided to label monkeypox as a ”disease dangerous to public health”.

This allows Sweden to implement measures and restrictions in order to stop the spread of this disease.

Up until the 1st of April, covid was also classified as a ”disease dangerous to public health” in Sweden, which gave them the powers to impose the restrictions.

Now the same classification is being used for monkeypox...Here we go again…

”With the classification access is given to take infection control measures that aim to prevent further spread” said social minister Lena Hellengren in a press release.

So now we could be getting monkeypox restrictions...

The disease has spread across Europe rather quickly in the last few days, with over 40 confirmed and suspected cases in Spain and Portugal. Today Britain is reporting that the number of cases have more than doubled since yesterday, with 20 infected now.

France, Germany, Belgium and Italy have also reported infections now.

Britain has already announced they are ordering more doses of smallpox vaccine Imvanex, which is said to be 85% effective against monkeypox

The USA have also announced they have already ordered 13 million vaccines at a cost of $119 million.

Meanwhile, shares for Bavarian Nordic, a Danish biotechnology company who produce the smallpox vaccine Imvanex has skyrocketed by almost 60% in the last few days.

Screenshot from Google of Bavarian Nordic share price.

The World Health Organization is setting up an emergency meeting with experts regarding monkeypox.

This comes just a few days ahead of the WHO conference in Geneva where they will be talking about a ”pandemic pact” which would give them substantial additional powers.

So what will happen now? Will the monkeypox become a new pandemic with lots more restrictions? Considering that monkeypox typically has a higher fatality rate than covid, that might not be out of the question in case infections spread.

Perhaps the covid passports will be updated in the future to include monkeypox vaccination? Maybe they’d change the name from covid passport to vaccination passport...

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