World Health Organization (WHO) just announced a recent outbreak of monkeypox outside of Africa global health crisis. The meeting of advisers, which took place on July 21, caused some controversy, as its participants held opposing views. However, in the end, it was the director general of the WHO himself, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesuswho intervened to tip the scales towards the emergency. Now what does this solution mean?
This may lead us to think about the warnings that were issued before the COVID-19 outbreak was declared a pandemic. However, this case is not quite the same. Just look at the sickness move much slower. The problem is that, despite the slower progress, it does not stop doing it. Cases continue to slowly seep around the world. They started out as a few men who have had sex with other men, indicating localized outbreaks. However, while the majority still belong to this group, there are now also heterosexual men and women and even children affected by the disease.
As of July 22 they announced 16,593 cases in 68 countries who had not previously reported monkeypox. It is clear that this is an exceptional situation, so both the Director of WHO and some of his advisers believe that there are sufficient grounds for declare a state of emergency. But the truth is that this probably means nothing, other than perhaps raising countries’ awareness of tightening containment measures. The emergency does not imply any obligations, it is just a new wake-up call to remind us that we must be vigilant about monkeypox.
Cases of monkeypox aren’t stopping, but they aren’t accelerating either
During the coronavirus pandemic, we have learned well that number R. This refers to the number of people an infected person infects on average. This is important when watching an epidemic or pandemic because as soon as it falls below 1, we can assume that the situation is under control.
In the case of monkeypox, the WHO models put its number R between 1.4 and 1.8. Although this is a value for men who have sex with other men. For the rest of the population, it drops to 1.
The vast majority of cases are uncomplicated, so this does not appear to be a very virulent variant. Many affected countries have already taken action and vaccination of people at risk. There is no monkeypox vaccine, but there is a humanpox vaccine that has now been eliminated, and it provides a very high percentage of protection.
Thanks to all this, it was confirmed that the rate of increase in the number of cases has slowed down noticeable in recent weeks in most of the affected countries.
However, according to Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the situation in Europe is still considered high-risk. This was the reason why he intervened to cut the connection between the councilors.
Thus, he hoped that all countries would keep vigilant control possible peaks. It’s a way of reminding us that monkeypox still exists, even if we sometimes forget about it. Also in the article for TalkPaul Hunter, a professor of medicine at the University of East Anglia, said the declaration of a state of emergency could provide an incentive to fund research into the disease. After all, it seems that we realize the importance of science only when the sword of Damocles hangs over us. While it’s not such a big deal, covering it up as an emergency could be the push you need to start thinking about funding that should have come in much sooner. In Africa, for example, this would be appreciated.
Source: Hiper Textual
