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Science, 8 August 2024
Rollout of vaccines will likely be a challenge as sixteen countries fight active outbreak
Africa poised to declare continentwide emergency alarm for mpox outbreak
In what would be an unprecedented move, the head of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC) says the organization will “most likely” next week declare a Public Health Emergency of Continental Security (PHECS) because of the rapid spread of mpox across 16 African countries. “What is critical to know is that in the past 10 days we have six new countries affected,” said Africa CDC Director-General Jean Kaseya, who spoke at a media briefing today.
Some of the most recent spread of the sometimes-fatal viral illness has come from an ongoing outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC)—the hardest hit country—which for the first time has seen sexual transmission as a major driver of the disease. The virus responsible for mpox is also spreading rapidly to children, who make up 60% of the cases in the DRC. “This a major alarm for the world,” Kaseya said, adding that Africa CDC is also working to increase the region’s supply of mpox vaccine, which has yet to be used in any country on the continent.
A PHECS declaration is a new option the Africa CDC created last year and is meant to improve the continent’s response to growing health threats. World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus yesterday announced he was convening an emergency committee to help him decide whether to declare a similar global alarm, known as a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC), which was done for an mpox outbreak that began in Europe in May 2022. That PHEIC ended in May 2023.
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