What we know (and don't know) about the new Mpox outbreak

The Briefing Room

BBC

News, News Commentary

4.8 • 731 Ratings

🗓️ 29 August 2024

⏱️ 28 minutes

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Summary

The first human cases of MPox were detected in 1970. But a new strain detected in Congo in 2023 has got scientists confused. How worried should we be and are we prepared for it?

Dr Jonas Albarnaz, a Research Fellow specialising in pox viruses at The Pirbright Institute Dr Lilith Whittles, lecturer and Sir Henry Wellcome Postdoctoral Fellow in the MRC Centre for Global Infectious Disease Analysis Dr Josie Golding, head of epidemiology at The Wellcome Trust Trudie Lang, Professor of Global Health Research at the University of Oxford

Presenter: David Aaronovitch Producers: Ben Carter, Kirsteen Knight and Drew Hyndman Sound engineers: Jonathan Glover and James Beard Editor: Richard Vadon Production Co-ordinator: Gemma Ashman

Transcript

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0:00.0	BBC Sounds, Music, radio, podcasts.
0:09.0	Monkeypox is now called Mpox and is nothing new.
0:13.9	Human cases were first reported in the Democratic Republic of Congo in 1970,
0:18.8	but a new variant, which also originated in the DRC is worrying scientists
0:23.7	because of the speed with which it spreads. Cases have also been reported as far apart as
0:28.9	Thailand and Sweden. The World Health Organization have put this virus on its priority pathogens
0:34.9	list, i.e. something that could cause a pandemic. Does that mean we should
0:40.1	be really worried about it? And if so, how prepared are we to tackle it? Step inside the briefing
0:46.0	room. Together we'll find out. First, the basics. What is MPox and how does it spread? Dr. Jonas Albinaz is a research fellow specialising in pox viruses at the Purbright Institute.
1:02.1	Jonas Albinaz, if I were to look at the organism that causes MPox in a microscope, what would I see?
1:09.1	Mpox is a virus and therefore is quite small.
1:12.2	I think a good way to try to visualize it is comparing with the virus that causes COVID,
1:18.0	SARS-CoV-2.
1:19.7	In comparison with SARS-CoV-2, M-Pox is much more complex, so it's a bigger virus and
1:25.3	around three times bigger.
1:27.6	So we are talking 100 nanometers for SARS-CoV-2,
1:31.6	around 300 nanometers in diameter for M-Pox.
1:35.0	And it has a lot more proteins.
1:37.2	So it has around 80 proteins,
1:39.0	which is 20 times the number of proteins that SARS-CoV-2 contains.
1:43.8	M-Pox is no longer called monkeypox.
1:46.1	It started off being called that.
	...

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