Africa has registered 45,327 cases (9,114 confirmed) and 1,014 deaths from mpox (a disease formerly known as monkeypox) since the beginning of 2024 in 18 countries on the continent, the public health agency of the African Union (AU) reported this Thursday.
As explained in a telematic press conference by epidemiologist Ngashi Ngongo, head of the Executive Office of the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC), this means that, so far this year alone, There have already been 400 percent more confirmed cases than in all of 2023.
The new number of deaths is below that reported last week -1110- after the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and Rwanda reported that some of the deaths had been reflected in duplicate, as confirmed by the Africa CDC communications officer, Margaret Muigai Edwin.
The DRC, the epicenter of the epidemic, and neighboring Burundi account for 96 percent of the thousand and one new infections confirmed in the region in the last weekwhile Gabon, Guinea-Conakry, Rwanda, Cameroon and South Africa have not reported any new cases in the last four weeks.
You may be interested in: This is the OFFICIAL payment schedule for the Welfare Pension for November 2024
Regarding vaccination against the disease, Ngongo explained that the shipment to the continent of about 5.6 million doses has been confirmed, including 2.5 million the vaccine produced by the Danish pharmaceutical company Bavarian Nordic and another 3 million of the drug from the Japanese company KM Biologics.
“The DRC, Nigeria, Rwanda, Central African Republic (CAR), South Africa and Ivory Coast have already prepared their vaccination plan” and two of them, the DRC and Rwanda, are already vaccinating, the expert detailed, specifying that Nigeria plans to start its own immunization campaign on October 29.
On August 13, the Africa CDC declared mpox a “continental safety public health emergency” and, the next day, The World Health Organization (WHO) announced the state of international health alert for the disease.
The WHO alarm alludes to the rapid expansion and high mortality in Africa of the new variant (clade Ib), of which a first case was identified outside the continent, in Sweden, in a person who traveled to an area of Africa where the virus circulates intensely.
LEE: Lake Chapala remains! This is your level today, Friday, October 25, 2024
This variant differs from clade II, which caused a violent outbreak in Africa in 2022, as well as hundreds of cases in Europe, North America and countries in other regions, and It has already led to the declaration of the international health emergency between 2022 and 2023.
According to the WHO, mpox is an infectious disease that can cause a painful rash, inflammation of the lymph nodes, fever, headache, muscle aches, back pain and lack of energy.
With information from EFE.
* * * Stay up to date with the news, join our WhatsApp channel * * *
MS