As monkeypox cases continue to increase, an expert is weighing in on how the virus is spread.
Could you get monkeypox by touching objects, fabrics, and surfaces used by someone who is infected? Yes, but the risk is low.Tiana Galloway said fears about monkeypox are changing her spending habits and, more importantly, the things she's touching.The Raleigh, North Carolina resident worries the virus could be present on items such as clothing."I often think about thrifting clothing, because that's trendy now, but it's concerning because these are clothes that people have worn.
Dr. David Wohl, a UNC Health infectious disease expert, said that though that can occur, the risk is low. "I don't think I would worry too much about these very casual encounters with inanimate objects. You're not going to catch this at a restaurant. You're not going to catch this off of a park bench. Trying on clothes I would say that's pretty unlikely. You would have to have somebody, who right before you tried on clothes, who had lesions with monkeypox virus," said Wohl.
The population most affected right now by monkeypox is men who have sex with other men and their sexual partners."It's not going to stay in the lane it is right now, and so we should be prepared," he said. "I think the No. 1 concern I have is, like staph infections or like MRSA infections, where we start to see this in daycares, where we start to see this in athletes, in wrestlers, where the body would have skin-to-skin contact.