Monkeypox outbreak could be just ‘the peak of the iceberg’, WHO warns

The World Health Organization has warned that 200 monkeypox cases found in recent weeks outside countries where the virus usually circulates could be just the beginning.

“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,” Sylvie Briand, WHO’s epidemic and pandemic preparedness and prevention chief, acknowledged on Friday in a briefing to countries.

Since the UK first reported a confirmed monkeypox case on 7 May, nearly 200 cases have been reported to the UN health agency in countries far from the states where the virus is endemic.

The European Center for Disease Prevention and Control has put the number of such cases at 219.

Monkeypox cases have been detected in more than 20 other countries around the world, including the US, Australia, the United Arab Emirates and nearly a dozen EU countries.

The Spanish health ministry said on Friday that 98 cases had been confirmed there so far, while the UK currently counts 90 verified infections.

Portugal has meanwhile registered 74 confirmed cases, health authorities said on Friday, adding that all the occurrences are in men, mainly aged below 40.

“We are still at the very, very beginning of this event,” Briand told member state representatives attending the World Health Assembly in Geneva. “We know that we will have more cases in the coming days,” she said, but stressed there was no need to panic.

Source: The Guardian