 [THEPOSTMILLENNIAL] Doctors have reported the first confirmed case of monkeypox that spread to a dog, potentially through its owners, a gay couple, calling into question whether pets should be isolated from owners diagnosed with the virus.
Or at least a bit of self-control on the owners' part.
According to medical journal The Lancet, on June 10, 2022, two men went to Pitie-Salpetriere Hospital, in Gay Paree, La Belle France, with the men complaining of anal ulcerations and rashes that had spread.
Sounds... unpleasant. The more reason to keep yer pants on when interacting with others.
The Lancet describes the couple as "non-exclusive," and says that patient one is a 44-year-old Latino man with HIV, while the second patient is a 27-year-old white man who is HIV-negative.
At least so far.
"The men had presented with anal ulceration 6 days after sex with other partners. In patient 1, anal ulceration was followed by a vesiculopustular rash on the face, ears, and legs; in patient 2, on the legs and back. In both cases, rash was associated with asthenia, headaches, and fever 4 days later," The Lancet describes.
My mental reconstruction of this episode is... yucky.
"We wuz playing nekkid Twister and the dog joined in..."
The two men were diagnosed with monkeypox through a PCR test, using skin, oropharynx, and anal samples.
"Hey! Careful back there!"
"Time for the oropharynx samples!"
"Ummm... What the hell is that?"
"It's an oropharynx sampler!"
Monkeypox has been spreading worldwide, mainly in communities of men who have sex with men, in recent months, with the World Health Organization declaring a global health emergency in July.
Not limited to men who have sex with men either.
| Hence the mainly. Sometimes it’s been small children, which is quite upsetting. |
12 days after the men were diagnosed, their 4-year-old male Italian greyhound began presenting symptoms, including "mucocutaneous lesions, abdomen pustules and a thin anal ulceration."
Golly. I wonder how that happened?
The dog subsequently received a positive PCR test result for monkeypox, using samples from the dog’s oral and anal cavity.
"Open up, doggy! Legume, hand me the oropharynx sampler!"
"Yipe!"
"Damn! Those Italian greyhounds are fast!"
"Monkeypox virus DNA sequences from the dog and patient 1 were compared by next-generation sequencing," The Lancet reported.
That was once they caught the dog.
"Both samples contained virus of the hMPXV-1 clade, lineage B.1, which has been spreading in non-endemic countries since April, 2022, and, as of Aug 4, 2022, has infected more than 1700 people in La Belle France, mostly concentrated in Gay Paree, where the dog first developed symptoms."
[WHINE!]
"Wosssa matter, doggy... Eww!"
The men said that they had been co-sleeping with their dog,
Ewww!
but noted that they had been careful to keep their dog away from contact with other pets or humans following the onset of the pair’s symptoms, 13 days before the dog began presenting these symptoms.
Maybe they shoulda just left the doggy alone?
The Lancet noted that testing results concluded a "100 percent sequence homology" between the virus that infected patient one and the dog.
That sound pretty certain.
"In endemic countries, only wild animals (rodents and primates) have been found to carry monkeypox virus. However,
nothing needs reforming like other people's bad habits...
transmission of monkeypox virus in prairie dogs has been described in the USA and in captive primates in Europa
 ...the land mass occupying the space between the English Channel and the Urals, also known as Moslem Lebensraum...
that were in contact with imported infected animals.
Define "contact." No, don't. I don't wanna know.
Infection among domesticated animals, such as dogs and cats, has never been reported," The Lancet reported.
"Here, kitty!"
[ROWR!]
"Jean-Pierre, put that thing away before you infect someone!"
The Lancet states that "to the best of our knowledge," the close timeline of symptoms displayed in both the owners and the dog "suggest human-to-dog transmission of monkeypox virus."
"Well, Bowser was askin' for it!"
"Given the dog's skin and mucosal lesions as well as the positive monkeypox virus PCR results from anal and oral swabs, we hypothesise a real canine disease, not a simple carriage of the virus by close contact with humans or airborne transmission (or both)," they wrote.
Sure. Doggy just happened to come down with it.
"Our findings should prompt debate on the need to isolate pets from monkeypox virus-positive individuals. We call for further investigation on secondary transmissions via pets," The Lancet concluded. 
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