Geneva, Switzerland- The World Health Organization (WHO) has stated that the world is still at the very beginning of the perceived monkeypox endemic adding that there will more cases in the coming days.
To date, WHO has recorded over 300 cases of monkeypox mostly from American and European countries.
“We are still at the very, very beginning of this event. We know that we will have more cases in the coming days. We don’t know if we are just seeing the peak of the iceberg (or) if there are many more cases that are undetected in communities,” said WHO’s Director of Pandemic and Epidemic Diseases, Sylvie Briand.
However, Briand said monkeypox was not like COVID-19 and could be contained if good containment measures are put in place now.
“This is not a disease the general public should be worried about. It is not COVID-19 or other diseases that spread fast. We think that if we put in place the right measures now we probably can contain this easily. For us, we think that the key priority currently is trying to contain this transmission in non-endemic countries,” said Briand.
Briand also encouraged countries to share information about first-generation stockpiles of smallpox vaccines citing there can also be effective against monkeypox.
“We don’t know exactly the number of doses available in the world and so that’s why we encourage countries to come to WHO and tell us what are their stockpiles,” said Briand.
Monkeypox is related to smallpox, a deadly disease that was eradicated in 1980 but monkeypox which is caused by a viral infection and can be found in animals including rodents and monkeys, as well as in humans is much less severe than most people recover within three to four weeks, with a fatality ratio of three to six percent.
