Benjamin Mateus – June 25, 2022
In a lead-up to the World Health Organization’s (WHO) emergency meeting on Thursday to decide on whether the current global outbreak of the monkeypox virus should be declared a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC), the World Health Network (WHN), an independent international collaboration of scientists and concerned citizens, said on Wednesday, June 22, 2022, that the monkeypox outbreak conformed to the definition of a pandemic.
They explained that without a concerted global action, the outbreak would continue and move into vulnerable populations such as children, expecting mothers and the immunocompromised. They warned that all people 40 and under who have never previously been immunized against smallpox remain extremely vulnerable to monkeypox, and that spillage into animals such as rodents and domesticated pets would potentially make the pathogen endemic in a broad geographic region with significant long-term consequences.
