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The director-general of the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Sunday that he is considering convening an expert committee to determine whether it is necessary to declare an outbreak of polio, a disease also known as “monkeypox,” an international emergency. According to AFP, plans are underway in several African countries.
Tedros said UN agencies and institutions such as the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are preparing to step up efforts to stop the spread of the virus, “but the global response needs more funding and support.” He said on the X social network, “I am considering convening an emergency committee on international health regulations, which will provide advice on whether the measles outbreak should be declared a public health emergency of international concern.” This qualification represents the highest level of alarm that the World Health Organization can trigger, and the director-general of the World Health Organization is the person who can trigger the alarm based on the committee’s advice. On July 11, the World Health Organization warned of the dangers posed by MPOX to global health and expressed concern about the spread of a new strain with a higher mortality rate in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Subsequently, Burundi, Côte d’Ivoire, Kenya, Rwanda and Uganda announced the discovery of more MPO cases. The Democratic Republic of Congo has also reported more than 11,000 cases, including 450 deaths. The virus was first discovered in humans in 1970 in what is now the Democratic Republic of Congo. With the spread of the evolutionary branch 1 substrain, it has since been mainly limited to countries in West and Central Africa, where patients are generally infected by animal contamination, such as after eating meat from wild animals. But in May 2022, infections with this virus occurred worldwide, mainly affecting gay and bisexual men. The clade II sublineage is responsible for these diseases. This global “monkeypox” outbreak led the World Health Organization to declare it a Public Health Emergency of International Concern two years ago, in July 2022. The WHO ended this state of alert in May 2023.
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