KITCHENER

Third monkeypox case reported by Wellington-Dufferin-Guelph Public Health

Daniel Caudle CTVNewsKitchener.ca Digital Content Producer

Published Wednesday, August 3, 2022 5:11PM EDT

This 2003 electron microscope image made available by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows mature, oval-shaped monkeypox virions, left, and spherical immature virions, right, obtained from a sample of human skin associated with the 2003 prairie dog outbreak. (Cynthia S. Goldsmith, Russell Regner/CDC via AP)

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The third case of monkeypox has been recorded by Wellington-Dufferin-Guelph Public Health.

“The most recent case is a 50 to 60-year-old male from Wellington County,” said Danny Williamson, spokesperson for WDG public health.

“That makes three positive cases in the region.”

Williamson said a data entry error caused a suspect case to be erroneously entered as a probable case. This means Public Health Ontario currently shows four cases in Guelph, when there are three. Williamson said this has been corrected, but this was after Public Health Ontario pulled the data for their report.

The first case in the region was reported on June 17 in a Guelph man in his 20s.

The second case was reported around July 20 in a male in his 60s who was visiting Wellington County.

WDG public health has provided 81 doses of the monkeypox vaccine to date.

DATA ENTRY ISSUE

A similar data entry error was recorded by the Brant County Health Unit with the Ontario dashboard showing two confirmed cases.

The health unit says there is only one.

Communications Manager for Brant County Public Health Ryan Spiteri told CTV News last week he checked in with the infectious disease team and has confirmed that Brant’s local case count for Monkeypox remains at one.

“We were notified of a second case, but after our case and contact management team conducted their investigation, it was found the individual does not reside in Brant,” said Spiteri. “The case has been transferred to another health unit and should be corrected on the provincial dashboard in the coming days.”

The dashboard still shows the second case linked to the health unit.

The Ontario Public Health epidemiological summary up to Aug. 2, shows there are currently 423 confirmed cases of monkeypox in Ontario.

The data shows the cases are primarily in men with only nine of the cases to date reported in females.

The Region of Waterloo Public Health and Emergency Services has yet to report its first case of the virus, according to the Ontario dashboard.