WHO Declares Mpox a Global Public Health Emergency

On Wednesday, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared the surge of mpox in Africa a global public health emergency, marking the highest level of alert as the situation continues to deteriorate.

The WHO convened a meeting of experts to assess the outbreak and advise the organization’s director-general, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, who accepted their recommendation.

“The emergency committee met today and advised me that the situation constitutes a public health emergency of international concern. I have accepted that advice,” Tedros announced at a press conference, emphasizing the seriousness of the situation.

“WHO is committed to coordinating the global response in the days and weeks ahead, working closely with affected countries and leveraging our on-the-ground presence to prevent transmission, treat those infected, and save lives,” he added.

This decision follows the African Union’s health watchdog, which had already declared its own public health emergency due to the growing outbreak.

Mpox, formerly known as monkeypox, has spread rapidly in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), where it was first identified in humans in 1970, and has now reached other countries. Tedros highlighted that over 14,000 cases and 524 deaths have been reported in the DRC this year alone, surpassing last year’s total.

“The emergence and rapid spread of clade 1b in DRC, primarily through sexual networks, and its detection in neighboring countries, is particularly concerning,” Tedros explained, which was a key reason for convening the emergency committee.

In the past month, about 90 cases of clade 1b have been reported in four neighboring countries that had not previously encountered mpox: Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda, and Uganda.

A Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC) is the highest alert WHO can issue, triggering emergency responses worldwide under the legally binding International Health Regulations. This is the second PHEIC declaration related to mpox, though it focuses on a different and more deadly strain of the virus.

In May 2022, mpox infections surged globally, primarily affecting gay and bisexual men, due to the clade 2b subclade. WHO declared a public health emergency that lasted from July 2022 to May 2023, during which around 90,000 cases and 140 deaths were reported.

The clade 1b subclade, which has been spreading in the DRC since September 2023, causes more severe illness and has a higher fatality rate than clade 2b. Mpox is an infectious disease transmitted to humans by infected animals but can also spread through close physical contact. Symptoms include fever, muscle aches, and large, boil-like skin lesions.

WHO experts recommend two vaccines for mpox. A PHEIC has only been declared seven times since 2009, including for H1N1 swine flu, poliovirus, Ebola (twice), Zika virus, Covid-19, and mpox.

Marion Koopmans, director of the Pandemic and Disaster Management Centre at Erasmus University Rotterdam, noted that a PHEIC “raises the level of alert globally and may allow WHO to access funds for emergency response.” However, she emphasized that the main priorities remain investing in diagnostic capacity, public health response, treatment support, and vaccination—challenges for resource-limited countries like the DRC and its neighbors.

The Red Cross announced it is scaling up preparedness measures across Africa, particularly in the heavily affected eastern DRC. The International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies expressed “profound concern” over the virus’s spread and pledged to play a crucial role in containing the disease, even in hard-to-reach areas where the need is greatest.