Is it “Pandemic X” that threatens the world?

11:52 p.m

Monday, August 19, 2024

Books – Ahmed Gomaa:

The growing spread of monkeypox around the world has raised fears of what the World Health Organization had previously warned could be “Pandemic X,” after the end of a pandemic. Corona.

A few days ago, the World Health Organization concluded that the large increase in the outbreak of smallpox (Empox) in the Democratic Republic of Congo and a growing number of countries in Africa is a public health crisis of international concern (a global health crisis).

mostly; “A pandemic.

World Health Director Tedros Ghebreyesus previously said he told world leaders that the issue was “a matter of time,” indicating that the epidemic was inevitable.

Regarding the current disease, Agence France-Presse explained that a new strain of the monkeypox virus, more deadly and more widespread than previous strains, was discovered in the Democratic Republic of Congo in September 2023, raising fears about the spread of this virus. universe.

Will it become “Pandemic X”?

An official at the Ministry of Health, and an expert in epidemiology, suggested that smallpox will not turn into an “epidemic” similar to the Corona virus, which threatened the whole world, which ’caused the closure of many countries, and which had many economic consequences.

Dr Hossam Abdel Ghaffar, spokesman for the Ministry of Health, says, “It is very unlikely that monkeypox will turn into a pandemic like Covid-19, including the latest ones like flu swine flu and Covid-19, usually outbreaks due to airborne viruses that spread quickly. ” “Including people who have no symptoms. “

Scientists say the risk to the general population in countries where there are no ongoing outbreaks of “mox” is low, according to a spokesman for the Ministry of Health, who confirmed that smallpox is spreading to very slow, unlike Corona virus.

He pointed out that shortly after the coronavirus was identified in China, the number of cases jumped dramatically from several hundred to several thousand in one week in January, and the number of cases increased more than tenfold, and no this has not happened so far with moray eels. .

As for Dr. Islam Anan, professor of health economics and epidemiology, he confirmed to Masrawy that monkey is not yet considered as the “Pandemic X” that the World Health Organization warned about; Because it does not have the characteristics for the virus to be a global pandemic.

Annan said, for example, that the virus is going to be a pandemic requiring it to spread quickly, similar to viruses that spread through the air or small droplets such as Covid-19, and that the level high death, threatening groups that are vulnerable to health, as well as how difficult it is to control There are treatments or vaccines for it.

He emphasized that “these factors are not found in monkeys, because the spread is not so fast that it raises concerns, and its deaths are still limited, and most of those who are treated infected with the exception of those suffering from an immune problem or the In addition, treatments and vaccines have been found with an efficacy of up to… 85%”.

The professor of epidemiology explained, “Mouse does not spread like Corona. The current variant has a low coefficient of spread and is still less than one, unlike Corona, which had a rate of spread of 15 per disease case.”

By March 2020, when the World Health Organization described COVID-19 as a pandemic, there were more than 126,000 infections and 4,600 deaths, about three months after the coronavirus was first identified.

But in comparison, it took from 2022 for smallpox cases to reach nearly 100,000 infections worldwide, with around 200 deaths, according to the World Health Organization.

Read also:

The first action from health after smallpox was declared a “public health emergency”

Like Corona… Will smallpox turn into a global pandemic?

Smallpox.. What are the most common symptoms of the disease?

Health updates guide on dealing with “monkeypox”… and distributes to “directories”