RAWALPINDI: The National Institute of Health (NIH) on Saturday reconfirmed a mpox case in the garrison city, however, doctors at the Holy Family Hospital said the patient was medically fit and would be discharged in a day or two.

The 28-year-old male patient arrived from Gujar Khan on August 18 with skin rashes and other symptoms related to mpox. He had gone to Saudi Arabia to perform Umrah and returned last week.

After arrival in the hospital, the doctors took sample and sent it to the NIH for mpox and informed the District Health Authority about the suspected patient. The NIH declared the patient as mpox positive but the HFH doctors decided to reconfirm it as the patient had a history of skin disease called darier which has similar symptoms.

HFH’s head of infectious disease unit Dr Mujeeb Khan told Dawn that NIH reconfirmed the patient as a mopox case but “we provided treatment to the patient and now he is medically fit and will be discharged in a day or two without any fear.”

28-year-old patient admitted to HFH is stable, will be discharged soon, says doctor

He said we prepared a list of close contacts of the patient in the last two weeks. “As many as 24 people were in close contact with him and the list has been provided to District Health Authority and the NIH. The NIH team also got details of the flight which the patient had used to come back from Saudi Arabia,” he said.

He said the NIH reconfirmed the case on Saturday but ’we already had taken all the measures and kept him in quarantine to avoid spread of the disease.“

He said doctors and other staff of the hospital were adopting the standard operating procedures issued by World Health Organisation for the infectious diseases including mpox.

He said that the patient arrived in the hospital with symptoms like that of mpox after investigation it was found that he was getting treatment for darier disease from a well-known skin specialist on Peshawar Road for eight to 10 years.

“As the patient informed about his skin treatment later, the doctors decided to reconfirm the case from the NIH.”

With the latest case, the number of people affected with the disease has reached four in Pakistan.

The third case of mpox was reported in May in Mandi Bahauddin in a foreign-returned passenger. The NIH confirmed that the infected person had returned to Pakistan from abroad. The first two cases of the disease were also detected in Punjab.

Published in Dawn, August 27th, 2023