Italian monkeypox cases up 27 to 689 in 3 days

(ANSA) - ROME, AUG 19 - Italian monkeypox cases are up 27 to 689 in the last three days, the health ministry said Friday.
    Confirmed cases of the virus have risen by almost 30 since the last report on August 16, it said.
    Cases linked to trips abroad are now 190, up five, the ministry said.
    The average age of those infected is steady at 37.
    The regions with the most cases are Lombardy with 297, up six; and Lazio with 125, up four.
    Emilia Romagna is up two to 72.
    Italy recently started monkeypox vaccinations with the first jabs being given at Rome's Spallanzani Hospital at the beginning of last week followed by others in Bologna and the rest of Emilia-Romagna.
    The other two priority regions, Lombardy and Veneto, began giving out doses of the vaccine later last week.
    On July 23 the World Health Organization said monkeypox was a "global health emergency".
    The vaccination campaign is not a mass effort like the COVID one but is instead directed at persons at greatest risk of infection such as gays, transgender, bisexuals and other men who have sex with men, as well as lab staff with possible exposure to the orthopoxvirus.
    The Spallanzani is Italy's premier infectious disease hospital and treated the first COVID-19 patients in early 2020. (ANSA).