The Fight Against Infections Foundation and the Germans Trias Hospital in Barcelona, Spain have identified transgender women as a highly vulnerable group to monkeypox that requires a special approach.
The research, the result of a collaboration between researchers from African countries, Europe, and the United States and led by the infectologist Oriol Mitjà, has been published in The Lancet and represents a detailed approach to monkeypox, analyzing transmission routes and treatment possibilities. .
The disease had an outbreak in Spain, now in decline, but remains active in Latin America and Africa.
The researchers also looked at the risk of death in patients with severe immunosuppression, especially in people with uncontrolled HIV infection, which is more common in low-income countries.
The study also looks at how to diagnose and treat people at risk more quickly and alternative strategies for people who do not respond to first-line treatment with the antiviral Tecovirimat.
As part of the project, the researchers looked at the disease in women for the first time, to allow for better diagnosis.
Although until now monkeypox has mainly affected men who have sex with men, women (cisgender and transgender) constitute a percentage of infected people to take into account for a comprehensive and inclusive approach to the epidemic.
The study shows that transgender women with monkeypox engage in sex work to a greater extent than cisgender women with the disease and are therefore at higher risk of sexual transmission.
Of the universe of these cases, 57% are infected with HIV.
Data on monkeypox virus infection in cisgender women highlight the risk of non-sexual transmission, which should be taken into account when diagnosing suspected cases.
“Both publications will be very useful to anticipate the evolution of monkeypox through better diagnosis and treatment of the disease, both in men and women,” says Mitjà.
After the results obtained in transsexual women, the researcher highlighted that this is “a very vulnerable group, which must be the object of a particular approach.”
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Source: TSF
