Monkey pox is not currently a global health emergency: WHO
World Health Organization (WHO) said after the meeting was convened on Saturday that monkeypox is not currently a public health concern of international concern.
“The WHO Director – General agrees with the IHR ‘s Emergency Committee’ s advice on a multi – country epidemic of smallpox and does not currently consider the event to be a public health emergency of international concern (PHEIC),” the WHO said in a press release.
Developments followed a meeting of the Emergency Committee of the International Health Regulations (2005) on the multinational epidemic of monkeypox.
However, the WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus expressed deep concern about this. On Twitter, Tedros wrote: “The response calls for urgent coordinated action to prevent the spread of the apinapox virus now by using public health measures and ensuring that health equipment is accessible and distributed fairly to at-risk groups. A full list of the committee’s recommendations.”
The WHO DG said it was deeply concerned about the spread of monkey pox, which has now been detected in more than 50 countries in five WHO areas, and that 3,000 cases have been identified since the beginning of May.
The Emergency Committee shared serious concerns about the scale and speed of the current epidemic, noted many unknowns, gaps in current data, and produced a consensus report that reflected the Committee’s differing views.
Overall, in the report, they informed the WHO DG that the incident did not currently constitute a public health emergency of international concern, the highest level of alert issued by the WHO, but acknowledged that the convening of the committee itself reflected concerns about the international spread of monkeypox.
The emergency committee announced its readiness to meet as needed. Since 11 May 2022, the WHO Secretariat has alerted IHR States Parties to this event by sending messages to the Event Information Website (a secure platform for sharing information with IHR States Parties established by the WHO Secretariat).
These publications aimed to raise awareness of the scale of the epidemic, to provide information on preparedness and to provide technical guidance for immediate public health action recommended by the WHO Secretariat.
The convening of the IHR Emergency Committee marks an increase in alert levels for IHR States Parties and the international public health community, and is a call to step up public health response in response to this incident, the WHO said.
The infection occurs in many countries where no cases of monkeypox have been reported in the past, and most cases are currently reported in countries in the WHO European Region.
In several countries, the original cases of monkeypox in different parts of the WHO had no epidemiological links to areas where monkeypox has been historically reported, suggesting that undetected infection may have persisted in these countries for some time.
The majority of confirmed cases of monkeypox are in men, and the majority of these cases occur among gays, bisexuals, and other men who have sex with men in urban areas and are grouped into social and sexual networks.
Source: ANI