Monkeypox: the epidemic soon to be qualified as an international emergency ? The WHO plans to convene an “emergency committee”
The head of the World Health Organization (WHO) said Sunday that he plans to convene a committee of experts to determine whether to declare an international emergency the outbreak of mpox, also known as "monkeypox", currently affecting several African countries.
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said the U.N. agency and the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, among others, were ramping up efforts to interrupt transmission of the virus.
“But more funding and support are needed for a comprehensive response“, he said on the social network X.
“I am considering convening an emergency committee on international health regulations to advise me on whether the outbreak of mpox “should be declared a public health emergency of international concern,” he continued.
This designation is the highest alert that WHO can issue and it is the head of WHO who can issue it on the advice of the committee.
A new deadly strain
On July 11, WHO warned of the global health threat posed by mpox, expressing concern about an outbreak of a new, more deadly strain of the virus in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Since then, Burundi, Côte d'Ivoire, Kenya, Rwanda and Uganda have announced several cases of mpox. The DRC has reported more than 11,000 cases, including 450 deaths.
This virus was first discovered in humans in 1970 in what is now the Democratic Republic of Congo, with the spread of the Clade 1 subtype, which has since been mainly limited to countries in western and central Africa, with patients generally being contaminated by infected animals, for example by eating bushmeat.
But by May 2022, infections with the virus had occurred worldwide, mainly affecting homosexual and bisexual men. The culprit was the Clade II subtype.
This global outbreak of "monkeypox" two years ago led the WHO to declare a public health emergency of international concern in July 2022. The WHO ended this state of alert in May 2023.
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