Mpox epidemic: Pasteur Institute ready to “test and vaccinate” patients at the request of French authorities

Faced with the resurgence of the mpox epidemic, which prompted the WHO to declare a public health emergency of international concern, the Pasteur Institute said on Monday that it was ready to “test and vaccinate patients at the request of the French authorities”.

"Since this weekend, after activation by the Directorate General of Health (DGS), the emergency biological intervention cell (CIBU) of the Pasteur Institute analyzes, on request health authorities, the suspicious samples", declared the Institute in a press release.

Internal protocol triggered

The medical center of the Pasteur Institute, specializing in travel medicine, which had treated patients with mpox during the previous epidemic in 2022, &amp ;quot;triggered its internal protocol allowing it to test patients presenting symptoms suggestive of mpox (…) in optimal safety conditions".

He stands elsewhere“at the disposal of the health authorities to vaccinate within its walls all people from the populations targeted by the health recommendations currently being reassessed”, he assured.

“This is a serious health situation”, commented Yasmine Belkaid, Director General of the Pasteur Institute, quoted in the press release. “Today, we are ready to test and vaccinate patients at the request of the authorities”, she added.

“State of maximum vigilance”

Prime Minister Gabriel Attal announced on Friday that the French health system was being placed in a “state of maximum vigilance” after an initial meeting with the ministers responsible for the subject. A new follow-up point was to be held at Matignon on Monday early in the afternoon.

In an interview with La Tribune Dimanche, the resigning Minister Delegate for Health Frédéric Valletoux said he expected “sporadic cases” of the new variant of mpox "appear, and probably soon" in France.

On Thursday, Sweden announced that it had recorded a case of subtype clade 1b, the same strain that has appeared in the Democratic Republic of Congo since September 2023, more deadly and virulent than clade 2, endemic in West Africa. A case has also been announced in Asia, in Pakistan.