Spain will buy the Monkeypox vaccine as its caseload reaches 55

As the country's case count reaches 55, Spain's health minister announced on Wednesday (May 25) that the country will purchase the monkeypox vaccine.

Carolina Darias, Minister of Health, stated that the government will buy the Imvanex vaccine from the Danish company Bavarian Nordic. She did not however specify how many doses would be purchased.

"We will allocate the vaccine in a proportionate manner across the 17 Spanish regions," Darias said at a media briefing in Madrid.

The majority of the 51 reported cases in Spain have been linked to an adult sauna that's been shut down last week. The remaining four cases were reported in the Canary Islands.

Some cases in both the regions, as per regional authorities in Madrid and Gran Canaria, had been linked to a 10-day Gay Pride festival in Gran Canaria, Canary Islands, in which 80,000 people gathered at the start of May.

The DGS health agency in neighbouring Portugal confirmed ten fresh cases of monkeypox on Wednesday, taking the total to 49.

The two Iberian countries have become the hotspots of the recent spike of the relatively mild viral disease beyond its endemic areas in parts of Central and West Africa.

All reported cases, according to the DGS, are seen in men, the majority of whom are under the age of 40. Nobody has been admitted to the hospital.

Madrid has also outlined multiple private homes where the virus was transmitted, some of which were visited by British citizens. According to a regional administration spokesperson,  British authorities are the first to report monkeypox viral cases on May 7.

The vast majority of infections detected thus far in the spread have been mild. Many, though not all, have been noted in men who had sex with men. Among the symptoms are a distinguishable bumpy rash and fever.