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As monkeypox cases climb, Texas cities declare emergency - LubbockOnline.com

As monkeypox cases climb, Texas cities declare emergency - LubbockOnline.com

Aug 13, 2022 2 mins, 24 secs

Dallas and Austin officials have declared monkeypox a public health emergency — bids both to get in line for federal funding and to send a message to residents that the virus is serious and painful and they should take precautionary measures while the vaccine is in short supply.

Texas’ major cities have received thousands of monkeypox vaccine doses and expect thousands more in the coming weeks, but a national shortage of the shot has officials and the people they’re trying to protect begging for more.

The idea of a public health emergency declaration may rekindle concerns about the sorts of business closures and other measures enacted during the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, but the orders over monkeypox include none of those measures.

The call for awareness comes as state and federal officials scramble for vaccine doses to contain the virus as it spreads faster each week.

Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra declared monkeypox a public health emergency in order “to unlock additional tools that will help us contain and end this outbreak, and to signal to the American people that we are taking our response to the next level,” Becerra said?

The CDC has said more doses are being procured but that the vaccine may not be widely and easily available until at least next year.

The Texas Department of State Health Services is sending more than 28,000 doses doses to public health departments this month, officials said.

Federal officials are also holding additional doses for states in case they’re needed before the CDC can re-up this winter and “may be released later depending on the status of the outbreak and vaccine administration data,” according to a notice sent to local health officials earlier this week.

None of those localities are expected to declare public health emergencies over monkeypox in the near future.

Strategies for deploying the vaccine in each public health region are up to the local officials and may vary, although state health officials are instructing providers to administer only to those who meet certain high-risk criteria or who have already been exposed through close contact, Van Deusen said.

After weeks of limiting the vaccine only to people who have had intimate skin contact with someone who tested positive for the virus, the state on Tuesday began to allow providers to administer them to certain high-risk people before exposure — a move patient advocates have said would be critical in containing the virus.

Broader eligibility means potentially more vaccine recipients, but state and federal officials are trying to prepare for that, too.

North Texas has one of the highest concentrations of cases compared with the rest of the state, state officials said

Public health departments have personnel trained in the administration method but DSHS still has to procure enough specialized syringes and needles before they can start doing the shots intradermally, Van Deusen said

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