The World Health Organization’s (WHO) emergency committee on monkeypox will meet “as soon as possible” to assess whether to declare the highest level of alert in the face of the ongoing epidemic in several African countries, the head of the organization announced on Wednesday.
Given the spread of monkeypox outside the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and the possibility of further international spread within and outside Africa, I have decided to convene an emergency committee […] to advise me on whether the outbreak constitutes a public health emergency of international concern, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said.
A new strain called clade 1b, which was discovered in September 2023, is worrying the WHO director-general, since this strain causes a more serious disease than clade 2.
Since the beginning of the year, 14,000 cases and 511 deaths from monkeypox have been recorded in the DRC and then in neighboring countries.
If the WHO emergency committee were to raise the highest level of alert, this would allow international support to be provided to the affected countries, including by raising funds.
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The various symptoms of monkeypox include skin lesions.
Photo : AP
This was explained by Dr. Joanne Liu, a pediatrician and former international president of Doctors Without Borders, where she notably fought epidemics in West Africa, the Middle East and Haiti.
We are really in a worrying scenario, knowing that it is a disease for which we have a vaccine.
A quote from Dr. Joanne Liu, pediatrician and former international president of Doctors Without Borders
To combat the epidemic, 50,000 vaccines will be donated to the DRC, but given that we are in a country of several million people, this is clearly insufficient, noted Ms. Liu.
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Dr. Joanne Liu, a pediatrician and former international president of Doctors Without Borders, has fought epidemics in West Africa, the Middle East and Haiti.
The virus can be transmitted through contact with a broken skin, blister, bodily fluids or respiratory secretions.
Symptoms of monkeypox:
- Skin lesions
- Swollen lymph nodes
- Very tired
- Pain in muscles or joints
- Fever
- Headache
- Night sweats
Symptoms can appear 5 to 21 days after exposure to the virus.
Source: Integrated University Health and Social Services Center of South-Central Montreal Island
A second epidemic since 2022
The virus, which was first discovered in humans in 1970 in what is now the DRC, carried by the clade 2 subtype, experienced a major global epidemic in 2022 and Quebec was no exception.
The WHO had then declared maximum alert in 2022 in response to the surge in cases worldwide, which mainly affected homosexual and bisexual men. The epidemic had caused some 140 deaths out of around 90,000 cases.
Following a significant resurgence in cases in Canada, a vaccination campaign targeting men who have sex with men, people who frequent establishments for the purpose of having sexual contact and sex workers and their partners was launched.
Even though the vaccine is not 100% effective, among people who have received the vaccine, we see presentations that are less serious. Fewer lesions, fewer complications, explained Dr. Geneviève Bergeron, medical head of the infectious disease prevention and control sector at the Montreal Regional Public Health Department.
When Radio-Canada asked Dr. Joanne Lui if we should fear a spread of monkeypox cases in Canada, she reminded us that we are never completely safe from everything, it is always possible. We know that viruses have no borders and that they move with individuals.
With information from Agence France-Presse
