The U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Tuesday approved a new method of injecting the monkeypox vaccine into adults, meaning less delivery of the vaccine between, rather than under, layers of the skin.
Health officials told a White House news conference that the emergency use authorization for the North Bavarian monkeypox Genius vaccine ( BAVA.CO ) would increase the available dose by five times because it uses only a smaller portion of the drug but provides the same protection.
The FDA has been authorized to ramp up the response against the outbreak after the United States and the World Health Organization declared monkey flu a public health emergency.
Genius was approved in 2019 for the prevention of smallpox and monkeypox in high-risk adults 18 years of age and older.
Under approval, it must be administered subcutaneously, in two doses.
Two doses of the vaccine, given four weeks apart using an intradermal injection method, will still be needed, the agency said.
FDA approval allows people under 18 to receive the vaccine by subcutaneous injection if they are determined to be at high risk of monkeypox infection.
So far, a total of 26,500 monkey flu cases have been reported in 80 countries where the virus is not endemic, according to a Reuters tally.
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