WHO Considers Declaring Monkeypox A Global Health Emergency

WHO considers declaring monkeypox a global health emergency

 MARIA CHENG

The World Health Organization convenes its emergency committee Thursday to consider if the spiraling outbreak of monkeypox warrants being declared a global emergency. But some experts say the WHO’s decision to act only after the disease spilled into the West could entrench the grotesque inequities that arose between rich and poor countries during the coronavirus pandemic.

Declaring monkeypox to be a global emergency would mean the U.N. health agency considers 

the outbreak to be an “extraordinary event” and that the disease is at risk of spreading across

 even more borders, possibly requiring a global response. 

It would also give monkeypox the same distinction as the COVID-19 pandemic and the 

ongoing effort to eradicate polio.

The WHO said it did not expect to announce any decisions made by its emergency 

committee before Friday.

Many scientists doubt any such declaration would help to curb the epidemic, since the 

developed countries recording the most recent cases are already moving quickly to shut it down.

“If WHO was really worried about monkeypox spread, they could have convened 

their emergency committee years ago when it reemerged in Nigeria in 2017 and 

no one knew why we suddenly had hundreds of cases,” said Oyewale Tomori, 

a Nigerian virologist who sits on several WHO advisory groups. 

“It is a bit curious that WHO only called their experts when the disease showed 

up in white countries,” he said.

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