Mpox was declared a global emergency on Wednesday by the World Health Organization (WHO) following outbreaks of the virus in Africa.
“This is something that should concern us all…The potential for further spread within Africa and beyond is very worrying,” WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on Wednesday.
The Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) previously announced that the recent spread of mpox had become a public health emergency. There have been over 500 deaths caused by the virus in Africa.
Last week, Ghebreyesus further spoke about mpox, also known as Monkeypox, saying: “There are two vaccines for mpox that have been approved by WHO-listed national regulatory authorities, and which are recommended by WHO’s Strategic Advisory Group of Experts on Immunization, or SAGE.”
“I have triggered the process for Emergency Use Listing of both vaccines, which will accelerate vaccine access particularly for lower-income countries, which have not yet issued their own national regulatory approval,” he said.
Medical staff wearing protective equipment enter the quarantine area of the center of the International medical NGO Doctors Without Borders in Zomea Kaka in the Central African Republic on October 18, 2018. On Wednesday, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared mpox a global emergency amid outbreaks in Africa.
CHARLES BOUESSEL/AFP via Getty Images/Getty Images
The Africa CDC reported that mpox has been detected in 13 countries this year, with over 96 percent of cases and deaths occurring in Congo. Compared to the same period last year, cases have surged by 160 percent while deaths have risen by 19 percent. So far, more than 14,000 cases have been reported with 524 deaths.
According to the WHO, “the monkeypox virus virus is an orthopoxvirus that causes mpox (monkeypox), a disease with symptoms similar to smallpox, although less severe.”
“Mpox is a zoonosis, a disease that is transmitted from animals to humans, with cases often found close to tropical rainforests where there are animals that carry the virus,” the WHO states. “The disease can also spread from humans to humans. It can be transmitted through contact with bodily fluids, lesions on the skin or on internal mucosal surfaces, such as in the mouth or throat, respiratory droplets and contaminated objects.”
While speaking about the current outbreak of the virus last week, Salim Abdool Karim, a South African infectious diseases expert who chairs the Africa CDC emergency group, said: “We are now in a situation where (mpox) poses a risk to many more neighbors in and around central Africa.”
The WHO previously declared mpox a global emergency in 2022 after the virus spread to 70 different countries. However, in that outbreak, less than 1 percent of those infected died.
While speaking with the Associated Press (AP), Michael Marks, a professor of medicine at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, said, “It’s a failure of the global community that things had to get this bad to release the resources needed.”
