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Faced with a surge in monkeypox cases, the head of the World Health Organization is Saturday expected to declare if the agency has decided to classify the outbreak as a global health emergency, the highest alarm it can sound.
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus will address a virtual press conference at 1300 GMT, the WHO announced in a statement late Friday.
It did not reveal what would be announced.
Monkeypox has affected over 15,800 people in 72 countries, according to a tally by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) published on July 20.
A surge in monkeypox infections has been reported since early May outside the West and Central African countries where the disease has long been endemic.
On June 23, the WHO convened an emergency committee (EC) of experts to decide if monkeypox constitutes a so-called Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC) — the UN health agency’s highest alert level.
But a majority advised the Tedros that the situation, at that point, had not met the threshold.
Read more: Pakistan reports 693 coronavirus cases in 24 hours
The second meeting was called on Thursday with case numbers rising further, which is when Tedros said he was worried.
“I need your advice in assessing the immediate and mid-term public health implications,” Tedros told the meeting, which lasted more than six hours.
A US health expert sounded a grim warning late Friday.
“Since the last #monkeypox EC just weeks ago we´ve seen an exponential rise in cases. It´s inevitable that cases will dramatically rise in the coming weeks and months. That’s why @DrTedros must sound the global alarm,” Lawrence Gostin, the director of the WHO Collaborating Center on National and Global Health Law, said on Twitter.
