WHO chief declares monkeypox a global health emergency
FILE - This 2003 electron microscope image made available by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows a monkeypox virion, obtained from a sample associated with the 2003 prairie dog outbreak. Two children have been diagnosed with monkeypox in the United States: a toddler in California and an infant who is not a U.S. resident, health officials said Friday, July 22, 2022. (Cynthia S. Goldsmith, Russell Regner/CDC via AP, File)
GENEVA: The head of the World Health Organization (WHO) on Saturday (Jul 23) declared the monkeypox outbreak as a global health emergency - the highest alarm it can sound.
"I have decided that the global monkeypox outbreak represents a public health emergency of international concern," Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said.
He noted that when he convened the WHO Emergency Committee last month to assess if the outbreak represented a public health emergency of international concern, there were only 3,040 reported cases of monkeypox from 47 countries.
"Since then, the outbreak has continued to grow, and there are now more than 16,000 reported cases from 75 countries and territories, and five deaths," he said.
"We have an outbreak that has spread around the world rapidly, through new modes of transmission, about which we understand too little, and which meets the criteria in the International Health Regulations.
He added that there is a clear risk of further international spread, but noted that the "risk of interference with international traffic remains low for the moment".
WHO assessed that the risk of monkeypox is moderate globally and in all regions, except in the European region where the risk was deemed to be high.
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