Mpox is a rare disease that can make you sick, including a characteristic rash. People often, but not always, have an earlier flu-like illness.

If you develop a new rash that looks like Mpox, talk to your health care provider, even if you don’t think you had close contact with someone with Mpox.

Images courtesy of UK Health Security Agency

Mpox Vaccine

Mpox vaccine is available to people who are eligible at a number of Health District and community clinics.

Find a Mpox Vaccine Clinic

Weekly Mpox Data

Probable and Confirmed Cases

in Clark County as of November 18, 2024

320

Estimated Vaccines Administered

in Clark County by SNHD-affiliated clinics as of November 18, 2024

12,084

NOTE: Case count and vaccines administered data are cumulative and includes data beginning in June 2022. For weekly case reports go to www.southernnevadahealthdistrict.org/Health-Topics/monkeypox/reports/.

Mpox FAQ

How is Mpox spread?

Mpox is contagious and can spread to anyone through close, personal, often skin-to-skin contact including:

Direct contact with Mpox rash, sores, or scrapes from a person with Mpox. This is believed to be the most common way that Mpox is spreading in the U.S.
People may contract Mpox after contact with materials that can be contaminated like bed linens, bandages or dishes they have used or surfaces or items they have touched.
Contact with respiratory secretions.
This contact can also happen when people are being intimate including:
- Hugging, massage, kissing and prolonged face-to-face contact.
- Oral, anal and vaginal sex or touching the genitals (penis, testicles, labia and vagina) or anus (butthole) of a person with monkeypox.
- Touching fabric and objects during sex that were used by a person with Mpox and that have not been disinfected, such as bedding, towels, fetish gear and sex toys.

Additional ways Mpox can spread include:

When a person comes into contact with the virus from an infected animal.
The virus can also cross the placenta from a mother to the fetus.

People who do not have Mpox symptoms cannot spread the virus to others.

Mpox can spread from the time symptoms start until the rash has fully healed and a fresh layer of skin has formed. This can take several weeks.

What are the symptoms?

Early symptoms of Mpox are similar to flu. Symptoms of Mpox include:

Fever
Headache
Muscle aches/backache
Exhaustion
Swollen lymph nodes
Chills
Rash that looks like pimple or fluid filled blisters on the hands, feet, chest, face, genitals, or inside the body including the mouth, vagina or anus.

It takes about seven to 14 days after exposure to develop Mpox, but the timeframe can be five to 21 days.

Mpox typically lasts for two to four weeks.

Is Mpox like smallpox?

Mpox and smallpox are from the same virus family called orthopoxvirus. Around the world, smallpox has been eradicated.

How is a case determined?

A health care provider would order testing to see if you have Mpox. Anyone with a rash that looks like monkeypox should talk to their health care provider, even if they don’t think they had contact with someone who has Mpox.

What is the risk of getting Mpox in the US?

Mpox is rare and does not spread easily between people without close contact. The threat of Mpox to the general population in the United States is low. Recommendations for those who may have had contact with Mpox virus are available on the CDC’s Exposure Risk Assessment and Public Health Recommendations page.

Is there a treatment?

Mpox and smallpox viruses are similar. Antiviral medications and vaccines developed to protect against smallpox may be used to treat and prevent Mpox infections.

Antivirals may be recommended for people who are more likely to get severely ill, like people who have a weakened immune system.

Is there a vaccine?

There are two vaccines currently licensed in the United States to prevent Mpox — JYNNEOS and ACAM200. The Health District is administering the JYNNEOS vaccine to people who meet current eligibility criteria.

The CDC recommends that someone exposed to Mpox should get vaccinated within four days after exposure. This will help prevent the onset of the disease. If someone gets vaccinated between four and 14 days after they are exposed, the vaccine may reduce the symptoms of Mpox but may not prevent the disease.

The CDC does not recommend widespread vaccination against Mpox right now.

How serious is the disease?

According to the CDC, the strain of Mpox that is circulating now is called the West African strain and it is rarely fatal. Most people survive Mpox if they have this strain but people with weakened immune systems, children younger than 8 years old, people with a history of eczema, or who are pregnant or breastfeeding are more likely to have serious illness or die.

While the West African strain is rarely fatal, the symptoms can be very painful and some people might have permanent scars from the rash.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has more information on its Mpox webpages. For more information, contact your health care provider or call the Southern Nevada Health District’s Office of Disease Surveillance and Control, (702) 759-1300.