Sindh Health Department on Thursday confirmed the first case of monkey pox in the province. The provincial health department said monkey pox was confirmed in a person, 30, who came to Karachi from Jeddah in the past few days. The infected person was a driver in Jeddah and he arrived at Karachi airport via Muscat. Meer Muhammad was isolated after his symptoms were identified. His skin lesions test returned positive for the virus from the Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre (JPMC) and his contact tracing is currently underway. As per the directives of higher authorities, the Sindh Health Department’s Expanded Programme on Immunization (EPI) team visited the JPMC intensive care unit (ICU) and emergency room (ER). The team comprised Deputy Director Dr Khalilullah Memon, Monitoring and Evaluating Officer Dr Arslan Memon, Focal Person EPI Dr Saira Zaidi and Statistical Officer Tanvir Ahmed Khan The patient, originally from Dadu, returned from Jeddah on May 3 through Oman Air (Jeddah-Oman-Karachi). He had also gone for Umrah on April 20 and had returned back to Jeddah from Makkah. In Makkah, he had suffered from a low-grade fever and had symptomatic treatment there. However, he did not have a history of lesions at the time. Moreover, the Saudi family who he worked for had no history of fever or lesions. Muhammad lived alone in Jeddah. On his arrival at the Karachi airport, the expat’s PCR sample was taken and sent to Dow University of Health Sciences. He was then admitted to JPMC on May 4 as a suspected patient of the virus while his PCR was taken again at the centre. Both PCR results came back positive. According to the patient, he did not come in contact with his family since his arrival in Karachi and did not have physical contact with anyone on the airplane. Currently, he has a mild fever with a cold at night and lesions all over the body, especially big lesions in the genital area. The patient also has a history of a mild cough which seems unspecific. The patient is reportedly doing well and is being treated symptomatically with antipyretics and antiallergics. His immediate people of contact’s samples haven’t been taken as per the doctor’s orders. The patient’s family is in Johi, Dadu, while his Pakistani friends are in Jeddah. Strict IPC measures have been taken at JPMC Medical ICU with a separate monkeypox isolation unit.