Around 80,000 visitors came to the “Maspalomas Pride” party in Gran Canaria in May. According to a media report, authorities are checking whether monkeypox could have broken out there.
The Spanish authorities are investigating the suspicion that gay pride parties on the holiday island of Gran Canaria could have been another source of infection for monkeypox. The newspaper “El País” reported on Saturday, citing sources in the health sector.
About 80,000 people from Spain and many other countries took part in the “Maspalomas Pride”, which was mainly attended by gays, from May 5th to 15th, the newspaper reported. Men from Italy, from Madrid and from the neighboring island of Tenerife, where the virus was detected, are said to have taken part in the celebrations. Intimate contacts are a possible transmission route for the virus.
The authorities closed Madrid’s “Sauna Paraíso” on Friday because several men are said to have been infected there as well.
Infections are occurring in more and more countries
So far, 30 cases of monkeypox have been detected in Spain. There are also another 23 suspected cases, the media reported on Friday. The local newspaper “Público” wrote about the situation in Portugal that 23 cases have now been confirmed. The first infected person recorded in Germany had traveled from Portugal via Spain to Germany – but it was initially unclear whether he was infected in one of the two countries.
Infections with the monkeypox virus are being reported from more and more countries. Fever, severe headache, back pain, sore throat, cough, and often also swelling of the lymph nodes are possible symptoms. A rash that spreads from the face to the body is also typical. Blindness and disfiguring scars rarely occur as permanent damage.
Milder variant in the patient in Munich
In the first confirmed case of monkeypox in Germany, the patient suffered from the milder West African of the two known virus variants. This was the result of the genome analysis of the pathogen at the Bundeswehr Institute for Microbiology, as the Bavarian Ministry of Health announced on Saturday. The Bavarian State Office for Health and Food Safety (LGL) currently considers the general risk of infection for the population to be low.
According to the Robert Koch Institute, the Munich patient, who comes from Brazil, is the first case of monkeypox in Germany. The Central African virus variant, which often leads to serious illnesses, has not yet been observed in the cases currently reported in Europe. The 26-year-old man went to the medical examination himself. He is being treated in an isolated room at the Schwabing Clinic.
