The Ministry of Health is reporting the first case of Monkeypox in New Zealand.
The person is in their 30s, lives in Auckland and has recently returned from overseas travel in a country with reported cases of Monkeypox.
There are currently 50 countries reporting cases of Monkeypox.
Given the increase in cases internationally, including Australia, the arrival in New Zealand was not unexpected.
We have already taken steps to prepare for the arrival of Monkeypox. Last month Monkeypox was officially listed as a notifiable disease enabling us to utilise the tools needed to contain any possible spread of the disease including isolation orders and readying contact tracing capabilities. A Monkeypox PCR test is available in New Zealand labs and is what has been used to detect this first case.
There are a very small number of contacts of the case who are being advised to watch for symptoms. There is no evidence of community transmission here.
To protect the privacy of the case and contacts, we won’t be providing additional information on them, but monitoring of the case continues.
Public health advice
Cases of Monkeypox outside of endemic countries have primarily been identified amongst gay and bisexual men and men who have sex with men, and international cases have been clustered around events where this occurs.
