My previous monkeypox article for Newsmax reported that as of Aug. 1 there were 5,811 monkeypox cases in America, of which 3,556, or 61%, were in 10 local jurisdictions.
As of Aug. 30, these localities, with just 11% of the nation's population, account for 9,100 of 18,417 cases, or 49%.
New York City still leads with 2,986 of New York state's 3,202 cases, or 93%. Chicago has 850 of the 1,058 cases in Illinois, or 80%.
Metro Houston has 563 cases; Dallas, 526; District of Columbia, 432; and Philadelphia, 327.
Los Angeles County currently has 1,421 cases, which added to San Francisco's 713, total 2,134, or 59% of California's 3,624.
Two counties — Miami-Dade with 704 and Broward with 578 — account for 1,282 of Florida's 1,913 cases, or 67%.
By contrast, each of 25 states has fewer than 100 cases.
Also noted in the earlier Newsmax article was the "encouraging news" that monkeypox cases were declining in NYC, the outbreak's epicenter.
This downward trend has continued in the nation's most populous city, as there were 504 cases for the seven days ending Aug. 1, but only 294 for the week ending Aug. 19.
Moreover, an excellent interactive graph from Our World in Data documents that cases in America have also slowed in August. They doubled in the eight days between July 24 and Aug. 1, from 2,875 to 5,792.
The next doubling took 14 days, reaching 11,844 on Aug. 15.
But in the next 15 days through Aug. 30, cases increased by 6,464 to 18,308, or a much slower 55%.
Other optimistic epidemiology of this infectious disease is that the global monkeypox outbreak is still confined to the same 12 Western democracies, which I identified in the Aug. 3 article as accounting for 21,802 of 23,620 cases, or 92%.
The CDC reports that, as of Aug. 30, these countries still total 92% of cases worldwide, or 45,896 of 49,974.
America leads with 18,417; Spain, 6,543; Brazil, 4,493; France, 3,547; Germany, 3,455; and United Kingdom, 3,279.
Peru has 1,463 cases; Canada, 1,228; Netherlands, 1,160; Portugal, 846; Italy, 760; and Belgium, 706.
Since the populations of these countries vary enormously — from America's 332 million to Belgium's 12 million, — cases per 1 million people provide a more accurate picture.
According to Our World in Data, Spain has 136 cases per 1 million people; Portugal, 82; Netherlands, 65; and Belgium, 58.
America has 54 cases per 1 million; France, 51; and United Kingdom, 50.
Peru has 43 cases per 1 million; Germany, 41; Canada, 32; Brazil, 23; and Italy, 12.
Worldwide, there are just 6 cases per 1 million people, and only 16 deaths, with one in America.
During the last two months, the number of days that global cases doubled has slowed appreciably, according to Oxford University's Our World in Data.
In the 18 days between July 8 and July 26, cases doubled from 9,460 to 19,846.
Then, it took 22 days until Aug. 17, for global cases to again double to 40,043.
In the next 13 days until Aug. 30, cases rose by 10,681 to 50,724, or only 27%.
More than 99% of American monkeypox patients are male, and transmission has been almost entirely among men who had sex with men.
The recent huge increase in the administration of monkeypox vaccines is another positive development in the battle against the outbreak in America.
The CDC documents, as of Aug. 23, indicate that 208,000 vaccine doses were administered. But injected doses skyrocketed from just 1,331 for the week ending July 2, to 52,316 for the week ending Aug. 13.
Another encouraging development comes from a recent CDC survey of 824 men who have sex with men, which found that half have prudently curtailed sexual activity during the monkeypox outbreak.
Undoubtedly, during the month of August, fabulous progress has been made, in America and 11 other Western countries, in suppressing the eruption.
Mark Schulte is a retired New York City schoolteacher and mathematician who has written extensively about science and the history of science. Read Mark Schulte's Reports — More Here.
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