U.S. health officials announced a new plan to broaden access to monkeypox vaccines amid a continued rise in cases.

Previously, vaccination was recommended only for people with a known monkeypox exposure. Under the new strategy, vaccine eligibility will be expanded to anyone who has been at a venue where monkeypox was reported and to men who have sex with men who have had multiple sex partners in a venue where there is known to have been monkeypox or in an area where monkeypox is spreading.

“It’s almost like we’re expanding the definition of who a contact might be,” Jennifer McQuiston, DVM, MS, deputy director of the CDC’s Division of High Consequence Pathogens and Pathology, told reporters in a news briefing.

“We’re considering contacts [as] people who may have had the type of exposure recently that would put them at high risk for monkeypox,” McQuiston said. “[If] they participated in a party or venue where monkeypox was known to spread but we can’t trace them, we recommend they come in for a vaccine.”

CDC Director Rochelle P. Walensky, MD, MPH, said people should be vaccinated within 2 weeks of exposure — “the sooner the better” — to reduce their risk for infection and illness.

Rochelle Walensky

HHS will provide 296,000 doses of Jynneos, an FDA-approved vaccine for monkeypox, over the coming weeks, including 56,000 doses that are available immediately. It expects to receive more than 750,000 doses to be made available over the summer, with an additional 500,000 to be released throughout the fall.

Jurisdiction may also request an older vaccine, ACAM2000, that is in much greater supply but is also associated with more serious side effects.

Jynneos vaccine doses will be prioritized for the areas with the highest number of cases and for people who cannot take ACAM2000 because they are immunocompromised, including people with HIV.

Jynneos is approved for adults aged 18 years or older and is given in two doses 28 days apart. Maximum protection is not achieved until around 2 weeks after the second dose, or 6 weeks after starting the series, Walensky noted.

More than 4,700 cases of monkeypox have been reported in 49 countries, including 306 in 28 U.S. jurisdictions, Walensky said. She said the nation’s vaccine strategy will be updated once more doses become available.

“With case counts and the number of jurisdictions with cases increasing, the need for medical countermeasures, including vaccines, continues to rise,” Walensky said.

The CDC also began shipping orthopoxvirus tests to five commercial laboratory companies last week and began training the labs to improve their familiarity with the tests, according to Walensky. She said public health labs can process more than 10,000 tests per week.

Also Tuesday, the CDC announced that it activated its Emergency Operations Center to respond to the outbreak.

References:

Fact sheet: Biden-Harris administration’s monkeypox outbreak response. https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2022/06/28/fact-sheet-biden-harris-administrations-monkeypox-outbreak-response/. Published June 28, 2022. Accessed June 28, 2022.

HHS announces enhanced strategy to vaccinate and protect at-risk individuals from the current monkeypox outbreak. https://www.hhs.gov/about/news/2022/06/28/hhs-announces-enhanced-strategy-vaccinate-protect-at-risk-individuals-from-current-monkeypox-outbreak.html. Published June 28, 2022. Accessed June 28, 2022.