The outbreak of monkeypox is raging in Africa, so much so that the WHO on Wednesday triggered its highest level of global alert.
This is the first time that an infection with the lethal variant of monkeypox (mpox) has been authenticated outside the African continent. A person living in the Stockholm region of Sweden has been diagnosed with mpox virus subtype clade 1, a more contagious and dangerous subtype, the Swedish Public Health Agency announced on Thursday.
“The affected person was infected during a stay in a region of Africa where there is a large outbreak of mpox of subtype clade 1,” Olivia Wigzell, acting head of the Swedish public health agency, told a press conference.
Highest level of global alert triggered
The World Health Organization on Wednesday triggered its highest level of international alert for the resurgence of mpox cases in Africa.
The emergency committee met today and told me that, in their view, the situation is a public health emergency of global significance. I accepted that advice, ”WHO Director-General Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said at a press conference. The who made the same decision in July 2022, when an outbreak of mpox spread around the world, before ending it in May 2023.
In the Democratic Republic of Congo, the mpox epidemic has killed 548 people since the beginning of the year and now affects all provinces in this country of about 100 million people.
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