New York, Aug 31 (IANS): There have been fewer new cases of monkeypox recorded recently in some big US cities and nationwide, but experts say it is too soon to tell if the trend will continue, media reports said.

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Director Rochelle Walensky, last week, said that she is "cautiously optimistic" about the downward trend but warned that the overall case count is still growing.

"The rate of rise is lower, but we are still seeing increases and we are of course a very diverse country and things are not even across the country. So, we are watching this with cautious optimism," she was quoted as saying.

As per the CDC, there were an average of 337 new cases of monkeypox reported each day in the US last week.

That's a 24 per cent drop from two weeks earlier -- a difference of more than 100 cases a day, the report said.

A few factors are "working together to bend the curve," Walensky said, including vaccination, behaviour changes and harm reduction messages "being heard and implemented".

Health officials said they are working hard to understand the factors driving case trends.