Geneva: In the strongest call to action, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared monkeypox as a public health emergency on Saturday.
It is the seventh time such a declaration has been made since 2009, the most recent being for Covid-19, which was given the same label by the WHO in 2020, and follows a meeting of a committee of experts on Thursday.
WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said, “The global monkeypox outbreak represents a public health emergency of international concern.”
Dr Tedros pointed out that a month after an Emergency Committee under the International Health Regulations was convened to assess whether the multi-country monkeypox outbreak represented a public health emergency of international concern, the outbreak has continued to grow, and there are now more than 16,000 reported cases from 75 countries and territories, and five deaths.
Monkeypox is a viral infection typically found in animals in central and western Africa, although it can cause outbreaks in humans. While cases are occasionally identified in countries where the virus is not endemic, the latest outbreak has been unprecedented.
