An elderly man who lived on his own in rural Alaska is the first casualty of ‘Alaskapox’ – a rare disease identified only nine years ago.

The unidentified, immunocompromised man died in late January, officials said in a bulletin Friday – weeks after he became the seventh person to ever contract the virus while living in the woods of the Kenai Peninsula.

As of Sunday, it’s still unclear how he contracted it – though the fact that he did confirms it has spread beyond local wildlife populations and into local communities.

Already a cancer patient, the man first reported signs of infection in September, citing a tender lesion that appeared near his armpit. The infection worsened, and after six weeks of emergency visits from state officials, he was hospitalized locally. 

As the situation continued to devolve, officials said he was transferred to an Anchorage hospital, where staffers were able to identify the infection but were unable to save him.

An elderly man who lived on his own in rural Alaska is the first casualty of 'Alaskapox' - a rare disease identified only nine years ago. Pictured: An Alaskapox lesion about 10 days after symptom onset

An elderly man who lived on his own in rural Alaska is the first casualty of ‘Alaskapox’ – a rare disease identified only nine years ago. Pictured: An Alaskapox lesion about 10 days after symptom onset

The unidentified, immunocompromised man died in late January, officials said in a bulletin Friday - weeks after he became the seventh person to ever contract the virus. Illustrations from an article titled 'Novel Orthopoxvirus Infection in an Alaska Resident'

The unidentified, immunocompromised man died in late January, officials said in a bulletin Friday – weeks after he became the seventh person to ever contract the virus. Illustrations from an article titled ‘Novel Orthopoxvirus Infection in an Alaska Resident’

He would go on to die in late January, the bulletin from the state Division of Public Health’s epidemiology section stated – before recounting the patient’s sad saga.  

‘In mid-September 2023, an elderly man from the Kenai Peninsula with a history of drug-induced immunosuppression secondary to cancer treatment noted a tender red papule in his right axilla,’ wrote doctors employed by the state sect.

‘Over the next 6 weeks, he presented to his primary provider and the local emergency department (ED) several times for clinical evaluation of the lesion and was prescribed multiple antibiotic regimens. 

‘A punch biopsy revealed no evidence of malignancy or bacterial infection,’ the account continued.

‘Despite antibiotic therapy, the patient experienced fatigue and increasing induration and pain in the right axilla and shoulder.’

Then, on November 17, medical professionals wrote, the unnamed man was hospitalized ‘due to extensive progression of presumed infectious cellulitis’ that hindered the use of his right arm.

This led to his transfer to the hospital in Anchorage, officials said – where, even with treatment, the man suffered renal failure, respiratory failure, malnutrition and a litany of other problems, the bulletin said.

The victim 'resided alone in a forested area [in the Kenai Peninsula] and reported no recent travel and no close contacts with recent travel,' doctor's wrote of the patient's infection and subsequent death

The victim ‘resided alone in a forested area [in the Kenai Peninsula] and reported no recent travel and no close contacts with recent travel,’ doctor’s wrote of the patient’s infection and subsequent death

An extensive battery of tests to discern the cause of the patient’s infection was performed, including ‘a plasma microbial cell-free DNA sequencing assay’ that can identify and quantitate molecules for more than 1,500 types of bacteria, viruses, fungi, and parasites.

The test initially came back as positive for cowpox virus on December 8, authors wrote – before a lesion swab sent to the Alaska State Public Health Laboratory for subsequent testing ruled out cowpox, monkeypox, and smallpox.

The test, however, did not exclude Alaskapox [AKPV] as a potential cause – and additional testing from the Centers for Disease Control went on to confirm the virus from the same genus as smallpox and monkeypox was.

The man, meanwhile, continued to complain to doctors of a ‘neuropathic-type burning pain’ emanating from his legion to throughout his body, before being an intravenous treatment meant to combat the infection.

Approximately 1 week into this treatment, doctors wrote how the patient’s condition  began to improve. However, ‘despite intensive medical support in a long-term care setting,’ the patient later exhibited’ delayed wound healing, malnutrition, acute renal failure, and respiratory failure.’

A combination of this maladies contributed to his death in late January 2024, doctors wrote  – making him the seventh in Alaska to fall ill from the virus and the first ever to die.

All the other victims fell ill in an Alaskan borough set 370 miles north from the woods where the victim lived alone, called Fairbanks North Star Borough, but all survived.

A northern red-backed vole is seen in this undated photo. Small mammals, especially northern red-backed voles, have been found to be infected with Alaskapox, a disease related to monkeypox and smallpox that first surfaced in 2015, with six mild cases occurring since

A northern red-backed vole is seen in this undated photo. Small mammals, especially northern red-backed voles, have been found to be infected with Alaskapox, a disease related to monkeypox and smallpox that first surfaced in 2015, with six mild cases occurring since

This was not the case for the man from Kenai Peninsula, who doctors wrote 'resided alone in a forested area and reported no recent travel and no close contacts with recent travel,' before eventually dying rom malnutrition, and kidney and respiratory failure late last month

This was not the case for the man from Kenai Peninsula, who doctors wrote ‘resided alone in a forested area and reported no recent travel and no close contacts with recent travel,’ before eventually dying rom malnutrition, and kidney and respiratory failure late last month

Katherine Newell, a CDC Epidemic Intelligence Service officer assigned to the Alaska Department of Health, works with a colleague in the Fairbanks area - the only other region where the virus has been detected - to collect small mammals that might be carrying the virus. The trapping campaign, conducted in September of 2021, found about three dozen small animals with signs of past infection or carrying the virus itself. Most were red-backed voles

Katherine Newell, a CDC Epidemic Intelligence Service officer assigned to the Alaska Department of Health, works with a colleague in the Fairbanks area – the only other region where the virus has been detected – to collect small mammals that might be carrying the virus. The trapping campaign, conducted in September of 2021, found about three dozen small animals with signs of past infection or carrying the virus itself. Most were red-backed voles

The first found herself stricken in 2015, and two more cases were identified in the summer of 2021. In the span since, four other non-fatal cases have surfaced, all of which were mild and did not require hospitalization.

This was not the case for the man from Kenai Peninsula, who doctors wrote ‘resided alone in a forested area and reported no recent travel and no close contacts with recent travel.’ 

He did report caring for a stray cat at his residence that regularly hunted small mammals and frequently scratched him, doctors wrote – citing one notable scratch near his right shoulder in the month prior to rash onset.

This tidbit comes as particularly important as the virus, aside from humans, has only been found in small mammals -such as voles and shrews.

The patient did not report other recent contact with small mammals but did report gardening in his backyard through September 2023, doctors wrote – pointing to the cat as one of the few possible points of infection.

Serum and mucosal swabs collected from the stray cat were submitted to CDC for antibody and orthopoxvirus testing, though all tests were negative.

Doctors stumped over the source of infection wrote: ‘The route of exposure in this case remains unclear, although scratches from the stray cat represent a possible source of inoculation through fomite transmission.’

They added that The State of Alaska’s Epidemiology is ‘working with the University of Alaska Museum and CDC to test small mammals for AKPV’ in and around the region.

Their efforts, as of Sunday, remain ongoing.

[ad_2]
Post source: Daily mail