So we know that a lot of you have questions
about COVID as well as monkey pox.
I want to bring in our medical expert
Doctor David, winner from Baylor,
Scott and White Health,
a doctor winner right now.
A lot of parents,
a lot of people are getting ready
to send their kids back to school,
but vaccine hesitancy is still an issue here.
What are you telling people
who say I'm not so sure about
getting my kids vaccinated,
especially when it comes to COVID-19?
Yeah, I'm very concerned about that Sonia.
This virus continues to spread when schools
open and kids start clustering together.
Another opportunity for to spread
even further and the vaccines
do work now in clinical trials.
Sonia there were zero serious side
effects and I've heard that only
half of kids now are vaccinated.
If you're six months and older,
you're eligible for a vaccine.
If you're five years and older,
you're also for a booster,
so hope parents will consider this because
it's safe and it is helped to spread.
Stop the spread of this virus.
Now Doctor Winter, what about these
more variant specific vaccines?
Do you expect them to be available
in the fall as we've been reporting,
or does that timeline
seem like it might change?
And I think a lot of people I know are,
like you know what?
I'm going to wait for that.
Do you suggest waiting?
Yeah, as you pointed out,
they're under development right now.
They'll have to be approved and
show that they work very well.
I suspect that they will current
target is sometime in September,
but let me point out,
the current vaccines do work for the
variants that are out there right now,
especially if you had one recently.
So if you have some
underlying medical conditions,
if your immune system isn't ideal,
you might want to get a booster now.
If it's been more than five
months since your last vaccine,
you can still get another one later
in the fall when they're available,
so they do work right now.
If you're healthy and you want to wait,
that's fine,
but some folks ought to consider
refreshing their booster,
but it's been more than five
months since the last one.
OK, let's talk about monkey pox,
the World Health Organization
announced it's a public health
emergency of international concern.
the US still hasn't gone that far.
What does this mean?
When we talk about the World
Health Organization making
this sort of announcement?
Yeah, clearly they see the spread.
It continues to spread.
It seem like every week we'd see
more and more cases out there,
so we need to take some
precautions about that.
The other thing I'll point out.
Traditionally this was began
monkey pox when you had it.
You had muscle aches, fatigue,
fever, then lymph node swelling and
then you got this rash of these
blisters pearly white blisters on
your face hands all over your trunk.
That's the way it usually starts,
but the newer cases now in
America seem to be different.
They skipped the first phase.
And have just a few little blisters
that tend to be in the private
parts under your underwear,
so not hard to see.
So be aware that it's out there
and it's highly contagious.
If you have skin to skin,
contact
Doctor Winter, I'm just wondering what
is the period of time where someone
might contract monkey pox and not know
they have it and then figure out or,
you know, talk to a medical professional
and and find out they have it and then
have to kind of go back and think OK,
where have I been?
Who have I been in contact with?
What is that period of time?
Yeah, we call that the incubation
period and that is a concern
because it can be a week or even
two weeks from contact to 1st
symptoms which may be blisters.
Or could be the fatigue,
the muscle aches and the fever.
So you've got two weeks there
where you're building up and you
can become contagious then also.
So I think precautions need to be
out there if skin that's in contact
very little spread any other way.
So understand if you're around
people you have close contacts,
skin to skin contact and they've got it,
you may well get it and
I. I just gotta ask you this really
quickly. Any way to treat it?
Because there are a lot of people
who say that this is a painful two
weeks that you're talking about.
Yeah, it can be quite painful.
The vaccines do work if you've
been exposed, get the vaccine.
They're becoming more available right now.
There's also an antiviral drug,
Technavio Amab now it's hard to find,
but that should become more available soon.
A lot of folks are just kind
of dealing with it, you know,
anti-inflammatory medications,
Tylenol that does seem to help,
but the best way is to avoid
it in the 1st place. Sonya
OK, indeed, doctor winter,
thank you for your time today.