The head of
the World Health Organisation said that the committee was unable to decide on
whether to declare an emergency, but he decided to do so anyway.
The head of
the World Health Organisation (WHO) has declared the monkeypox outbreak a
"global health emergency".
Dr Tedros
Adhanom Ghebreyesus told a news conference that despite the WHO committee being
unable to come to a consensus, he declared the emergency anyway as the
tie-breaking vote.
He added the
risk globally is "moderate", except in Europe where it is
"high".
Dr Ghebreyesus
said there had been more than 16,000 cases of monkeypox reported to the WHO
from 75 countries, and five deaths.
The
declaration by the WHO is designed to trigger an international response to the
outbreak, which could unlock funding and vaccine sharing.
Dr
Ghebreyesus also gave recommendations on how to implement a response,
including:
·
To
engage and protect affected communities;
·
To
intensify surveillance and public health measures;
·
To
strengthen clinical management and infection prevention and control in
hospitals and clinics;
·
To
accelerate research into the use of vaccines, therapeutics and other tools.
The disease
has had a foothold in parts of central and west Africa for decades, and was not
known to trigger large outbreaks beyond the continent.
However, in
May, authorities in the US and western Europe detected dozens of outbreaks.
Monkeypox
joins COVID-19, Ebola, and Zika on the list of previously declared global
health emergencies.
Earlier this
week, Dr Rosamund Lewis, the WHO's monkeypox expert, said 99% of all cases
outside of Africa were in men, with 98% in men who have sex with other men.
She also
warned that "stigma and discrimination are not okay. Stigma will not help,
it will drive people away from seeking diagnostics."
Some experts
believe the spread began at two raves in Belgium and Spain.
The NHS
website currently lists a high temperature, a headache, muscle aches, backache,
swollen glands, shivering and exhaustion as symptoms, and is often
characterised by pus-filled lesions on the skin.
The UK
Health Security Agency (UKHSA) has procured an additional 100,000 doses of a
vaccine to help tackle the spread of the virus, with those eligible being
contacted by the NHS to get their jabs.
'We cannot
afford to keep waiting for diseases to escalate before we intervene'
A total of
2,137 cases have been confirmed in the UK, with 2,050 in England - the majority
of which are in London, according to the latest figures released on 18 July.
In response
to the move by the WHO, Dr Josie Golding, head of epidemics and epidemiology at
health charity Wellcome, said: "Our world is growing increasingly
vulnerable to outbreaks of infectious disease. The declaration of another
Public Health Emergency of International Concern should serve as stark reminder
to world leaders of this modern reality, and the weaknesses in our collective ability
to prepare and respond.
"With
monkeypox cases continuing to rise and spread to more countries, we now face a
dual challenge: an endemic disease in Africa that has been neglected for
decades, and a novel outbreak affecting marginalised communities. Governments
must take this more seriously and work together internationally to bring this
outbreak under control.
"Tried
and tested public health measures including strengthened disease surveillance,
contact tracing and equitable access to tests, treatments and vaccines for
those most at risk is crucial. But governments must also support more research
to understand why we are seeing new patterns of transmission, evaluate the
effectiveness of our current tools and support the development of improved
interventions.
"Without
this swift and concentrated action, monkeypox will continue to infect even more
people unnecessarily and become established in more populations, including the
risk of reverse spillover into animals. We cannot afford to keep waiting for
diseases to escalate before we intervene."
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