ATLANTA – Cases of COVID-19 and monkeypox are continuing to decline in Georgia, officials with the state Department of Public Health reported Tuesday.
COVID cases in Georgia are down about 80% since mid-August, Dr. Cherie Drenzek, the agency’s epidemiologist and chief science officer, told members of the state Board of Public Health.
Hospitalizations are down 89% since the omicron variant hit its peak last winter, while the number of deaths from the virus in Georgia has fallen to about 100 per week, she said.
However, three new omicron subvariants are starting to show up in Georgia and around the country, Drenzek said. Together, they account for about 23% of the current caseload in Georgia, she said.
“Whether they will continue to grow or not, I can’t say for certain,” Drenzek said. “It warrants us keeping a close eye on them.”
Dr. Alexander Millman, chief medical officer for the Department of Public Health (DPH), said the new booster shots that target the omicron variant can be administered at the same time as annual flu shots.
The new boosters are widely available to adults, while the U.S. Food and Drug Administration is expected to approve the children’s version of the booster soon, he said.
Drenzek said cases of monkeypox have declined consistently during the last few weeks both in Georgia and nationally.
Georgia has 1,839 cases of the virus in 64 counties, she said. However, 85% of those cases are concentrated in metro Atlanta, she said.
The vast majority of cases are in men who have sex with men, Drenzek said. In fact, 98% of the Georgia cases are in men.
Only 5% percent of the state’s monkeypox patients are hospitalized, Drenzek said.
However, a small number of cases are severe, usually involving HIV-positive men with compromised immune systems, she said.
Millman said monkeypox vaccines are proving highly effective in preventing the disease.
“This vaccine is truly able to protect people who have had exposure from developing monkeypox,” he said.
Amy Benson, who heads the Georgia Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Disabilities’ Opioid Substance Misuse Response Program, told board members a new version of multi-colored fentanyl is gaining national attention.
None of the “rainbow” fentanyl has appeared yet in Georgia or bordering states, but it’s likely a matter of time before it does, she said.
While law enforcement agencies haven’t uncovered any efforts to market the drug to children, the multiple colors would appeal to young people, Benson said.
“With Halloween coming up, this is something that potentially could be a problem,” DPH Commissioner Dr. Kathleen Toomey said.
Benson said efforts are underway in Georgia to increase public access to fentanyl test strips and to naloxone, a drug used to treat opioid overdoses.
This story is available through a news partnership with Capitol Beat News Service, a project of the Georgia Press Educational Foundation.
ATLANTA – Both COVID and monkeypox rates are starting to decline in Georgia, the state’s chief science officer said Tuesday during an update to the state Board of Public Health.
“Last week, we saw a 38% decline in [COVID] cases in Georgia,” said Dr. Cherie Drenzek, epidemiologist and chief science officer for the state Department of Public Health (DPH).
“Hospitalizations and deaths have also declined about 20% in the last two weeks,” Drenzek added, noting there are about 120 deaths per week in Georgia now.
Monkeypox infection rates are also starting to decline in Georgia, Drenzek said.
All told, there have been close to 1,600 cases in Georgia, with most of those in metro Atlanta. The majority of the people who have been infected have been men who have sex with men. Only 2% of those infected have been women.
And at least 50% of those diagnosed with monkeypox had also tested positive for a sexually transmitted infection in the last year, Drenzek said.
Dr. Alex Millman, Georgia’s chief medical officer, said the state’s monkeypox vaccine effort has focused on outreach to community groups, pop-up vaccine events, and social media messaging.
Currently, vaccines are administered across Georgia, and people can book appointments online through a DPH website.
The vaccines are indicated for people who have already been exposed to monkeypox or who have a high risk of being exposed, Millman said.
So far, around 22,000 first doses of the two-dose vaccine have been administered to Georgians, he said.
DPH administered more than 4,000 doses during the recent Atlanta Black Pride week, he said.
The DPH board approved a plan to continue meeting virtually each month and hold hybrid in-person/virtual meetings each quarter.
This story is available through a news partnership with Capitol Beat News Service, a project of the Georgia Press Educational Foundation.
The disease has spread across the country to the point that the Biden administration declared monkeypox a national public health emergency last week.
Monkeypox is a viral disease that causes the skin to break out into painful lesions and is also accompanied by other symptoms such as fever, exhaustion, and muscle aches.
Since the first cases were reported in the United States a few months ago, scientific understanding of how it spreads has evolved.
“The monkeypox virus can spread from person to person through direct contact with the infectious rash, scabs, or body fluids,” said Nancy Nydam, spokeswoman for the state Department of Public Health (DPH). “It also can be spread by respiratory secretions during prolonged, face-to-face contact, or during intimate physical contact, such as kissing, cuddling, or sex.”
“Touching items (such as clothing or linens) that previously touched the infectious rash or body fluids is another way monkeypox spreads but has not been identified to be a common mode of transmission in this outbreak or for monkeypox in general,” Nydam added.
According to the CDC, 7,510 cases of monkeypox have been reported in the United States.
The Jynneos vaccine can help prevent monkeypox. The vaccination requires two doses 28 days apart.
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has allocated 1.1 million doses of the vaccine to send to states. Around 600,000 have been shipped already, according to the agency.
Georgia has been allocated about 50,000, according to the HHS.
Not all of the doses have yet reached the state due to federal rules about vaccine distribution and transit times, Nydam said.
So far, almost all of the cases in the United States have been identified in men who have sex with men, according to a CDC briefing last month.
DPH has distributed the vaccines across Georgia, including to county health departments and community organizations, Nydam said.
Jeff Graham, executive director of the LGBTQ advocacy group Georgia Equality, praised the outreach work being done by county health departments and community groups. But he said those efforts won’t be truly effective without more resources and better coordination from the DPH.
“The state must show more leadership on a coordinated approach to ensuring that vaccine distribution is equitable around the state, and they need to provide better data concerning folks contracting monkeypox and those receiving the vaccine,” Graham said. “Also, adequate funding for the community outreach of whatever the state’s plan is will be a critical component of an adequate response.”
Advocates warn that though the disease is concentrated so far among gay men, it’s important that the larger community pay attention because the disease affects everyone.
“We can’t stigmatize disease,” said Dafina Ward, executive director of the Southern AIDS Coalition. “What we can’t do is recreate the misinformation and shaming that so many experienced early on in the HIV/AIDS epidemic.”
Ward said that though monkeypox can be spread by sexual contact, it is not solely a sexually transmitted disease.
For that reason, everyone should be concerned, Ward said.
“Monkeypox does not care about a person’s sexual orientation or gender identity,” she said. “Every community needs access to testing, vaccine, and treatment.”
This story is available through a news partnership with Capitol Beat News Service, a project of the Georgia Press Educational Foundation.
The 3,000 Jynneos vaccines received so far are enough to vaccinate 1,500 people, agency spokeswoman Nancy Nydam said. A full vaccination requires two doses 28 days apart.
So far, 93 people with confirmed monkeypox cases have been identified in Georgia, all among men in metro Atlanta, Nydam said. Most are men who have sex with men.
The Jynneos monkeypox vaccines have been sent to health departments that have requested them and will also be distributed at two vaccine events, Nydam said.
Distribution at first will be focused on the metro region’s core counties of Fulton, DeKalb, Gwinnett, Cobb, and Clayton, she said.
The Jynneos vaccine was chosen because of its better safety profile, chief medical officer Dr. Alexander Millman said at the state board of public health meeting Tuesday.
Georgia is following the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) guidelines that suggest vaccinating high-risk individuals first, Nydam said.
“Vaccination may be recommended for people who are close personal contacts of people with monkeypox, individuals who may have been exposed to monkeypox, or people who have increased risk of being exposed to the virus such as lab workers,” she said.
Monkeypox is a viral disease that causes the skin to break out in pustules. The disease is usually mild but can be life threatening in some cases.
Nydam said monkeypox is not transmitted like COVID but rather through close, skin-to-skin contact with people who have monkeypox.
“While many of those affected in the current global outbreaks are gay, bisexual, or other men who have sex with men, anyone who has been in close contact with someone who has monkeypox can get the illness,” Nydam said.
The DPH announced the first case of monkeypox in Georgia June 1. According to CDC data posted this week, Georgia’s 96 cases put it fourth in the country after New York, California, and Illinois.
Georgia is expected to receive additional vaccines from the federal government later this summer “as production of the vaccine ramps up,” Nydam said.
In the meantime, Nydam said, people who think they may have been exposed to monkeypox should contact their health-care provider.
This story is available through a news partnership with Capitol Beat News Service, a project of the Georgia Press Educational Foundation.
The monkeypox virus (photo credit: CDC/Cynthia S. Goldsmith)
ATLANTA – The federal government is releasing monkeypox vaccine to Georgia in a phased approach.
The state will receive 5,943 doses of the Jynneos vaccine from the Strategic National Stockpile during the first two phases, Dr. Alexander Millman, chief medical officer for the Georgia Department of Public Health (DPH), told the agency’s board Tuesday.
The DPH will focus that initial supply on two main groups: people who have “high-risk” exposure to a confirmed monkeypox case and others who have “certain risk factors that might make them likely to have had high-risk exposure” to the monkeypox virus.
The vaccine doses for Georgia must be carefully managed, especially because each person needs two shots a month apart, Millman said.
Millman explained that though there is another potential vaccine for monkeypox, the ACAM-2000 vaccine, the federal government is releasing the Jynneos vaccine because it is generally safer.
Georgia has identified more than 40 monkeypox cases so far, Dr. Cherie Drenzek, the state epidemiologist, said Tuesday.
Monkeypox is a viral disease that causes the skin to break out in pustules. The disease is usually mild but can be life threatening in some cases. The current outbreak is unusual because, as of last month, at least 3,400 cases had been identified in countries where monkeypox is not typically found.
Drenzek said monkeypox requires “very close person-to-person contact” for transmission, making it different from COVID or other respiratory diseases that are transmitted through the air.
She said the Georgia monkeypox cases have all been found in people who are from the “broad metro area of Atlanta,” though that interpretation may reflect a testing capability bias.
Drenzek said monkeypox in the current outbreak is primarily being found among men who have sex with men.
The greatest risk factor for monkeypox is close contact with someone else who had monkeypox lesions, she said.
The recent Georgia cases do not include histories of international travel, Drenzek said.
“This suggests…that there is established community spread,” she added.
The current global outbreak of monkeypox differs from prior known outbreaks in several ways, Drenzek said. Patients with monkeypox in the current global outbreak tend to have very few lesions – “even one to two,” she said.
“It just doesn’t look like what we knew monkeypox to look like in the past,” she said.
Drenzek said the DPH laboratory has been testing for monkeypox, and twonew commercial labs can now test for the disease as well. Other commercial labs in Georgia will soon be able to test for the disease she said.
Drenzek said the DPH has epidemiologists on call 24-7 to consult with clinicians about suspected cases of monkeypox at 1-866-PUB-HLTH.
In other news from Tuesday’s meeting, Drenzek told DPH board members a large number of cases of COVID-19 in Georgia are now attributable to the new BA.5 variant of the virus.
BA.5 currently accounts for 65% of all SARS-COVID circulating virus, according to the latest figures from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
COVID vaccines and boosters have played a key role in reducing severe COVID outcomes like hospitalization and death.
“These boosters are still holding very well against severe outcomes,” Drenzek said.
Drenzek said most hospitalizations and deaths have been among those who are not vaccinated, and the greatest numbers of those dying are more than 70 years old.
“It’s a matter of getting boosted now,” she said.
Drenzek suggested that soon the United States might approve a second booster for people under 50.
Nancy Nydam, communications director for the DPH, showed a new COVID vaccination ad campaign that encourages Georgians to get vaccinated.
This story is available through a news partnership with Capitol Beat News Service, a project of the Georgia Press Educational Foundation.
