Hans Kluge, the World Health Organization’s (WHO) regional director for Europe, admitted Tuesday that mpox would not lead to a “cycle of panic” and lockdowns like Covid-19 did, despite the public health emergency of international concern (PHEIC) declaration. In a UN briefing on Tuesday, Kluge said that this time around the disease can be kept under control by supplying enough vaccines to the affected countries in Africa and closely monitoring the monkeypox patients. “Are we going to lockdown the WHO European region? Is it another Covid-19? The answer is clearly: ‘no,’” Kluge stressed.
“Two years ago, we controlled mpox in Europe thanks to direct engagement with the most affected communities of men who have sex with men,” he added. “Will we choose to put the systems in place to control and eliminate mpox globally or will we enter another cycle of panic, then neglect?,” he also wondered. The milder variant of the mpox virus, dubbed Clade 2, spread in 2022.
Now, a more infectious strain, Clade 1b, has killed hundreds of people in central Africa and was detected last week in Sweden. The overwhelming majority of Clade 2 cases occurred among gay and bisexual men, particularly those with multiple sexual partners. Clade 1b is believed to spread more easily through close, non-sexual contact.
The world already knows a lot about mpox, so it cannot be considered the new covid, Kluge insisted. Mpox is not the new covid. Whether it is mpox clade I, which cau.