PEORIA, Ill. – There may be health emergencies both in Illinois and the United States over an outbreak of monkeypox, but local health officials aren’t sounding an alarm for now.
Peoria City/County Health Department Administrator Monica Hendrickson declined our request for an interview, but a statement from the department indicates they are monitoring the situation and are ready to work with healthcare providers.
“At Peoria City/County Health Department, we continue to monitor with healthcare providers for monkeypox and work with our healthcare providers when they have questions,” said a Health Department statement. “We do not have any confirmed monkeypox in Peoria County.”
Currently IDPH distributes vaccines based on confirmed cases in counties, and then they allocate by high-risk populations. The IDPH website is updated weekly with the total number of monkeypox cases for Illinois.
There are currently zero cases of monkeypox in Peoria County. There are 571 in all of Illinois, and officials believes most of those are among males who have sex with other males.
