LONDON: More than 6,000 cases of monkeypox have now been reported from 58 countries in the current outbreak, the WHO has said. The UN agency will reconvene a meeting of the committee that will advise on declaring the outbreak a global health emergency, the WHO's highest level of alert, in the week beginning July 18 or sooner, Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told a virtual news conference from Geneva.
At its previous meeting on June 27, the committee decided that the outbreak, which has seen cases rising both in the African countries where it usually spreads and globally, was not yet a health emergency. "I continue to be concerned by the scale and spread of the virus across the world," Tedros said, adding that a lack of testing meant that there were likely many more cases going unreported. Around 80% of cases are in Europe, he said. "Testing remains a challenge and it's highly probable that there are a significant number of cases not being picked up." Most monkeypox infections so far have been observed in men who have sex with men, of young age and chiefly in urban areas, according to WHO.
Monkeypox, a usually mild viral infection that causes flu-like symptoms and skin lesions, has been spreading worldwide since May. The fatality rate in previous outbreaks in Africa has been around 1%, but so far this outbreak seems to be less lethal in the non-endemic countries.
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