As reported by the Associated Press, global health experts are cautiously optimistic that the monkeypox outbreak may be reaching its peak in some of the world's most severely affected locations.
The World Health Organization (WHO), which deemed the spread of the virus to be an international emergency in July, announced on Thursday that the number of monkeypox cases reported globally had decreased by 21% over the previous week, reversing a pattern of rising infections for the previous month. Over the preceding month, the Americas accounted for 60% of instances while Europe made up 38%.
According to the most recent statistics provided by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, there are presently more than 47,000 cases in 89 countries, around three months into the global outbreak (CDC). There are 17,000 cases of monkeypox infections in the 50 states of the United States
British health officials reported last week that there were "early signs" that the monkeypox outbreak in the nation was slowing. However, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the director-general of WHO, issued a warning during a press conference on Thursday, noting that the virus's spread was now raising worries outside of Europe and North America.
"In Latin America in particular, insufficient awareness or public health measures are combining with a lack of access to vaccines to fan the flames of the outbreak," Tedros said.
According to Reuters, Dr. Gerardo Chowell, an infectious disease modeler at the School of Public Health at Georgia State University, stated that his most recent model predicts a prolonged reduction in new monkeypox cases in the United States over the course of the upcoming month.
"It's highly likely that the pandemic peaked last week," he said, adding that further drops may not be sufficient to entirely extinguish the outbreak but should reduce infection numbers to "very low levels."
The Biden administration took new steps last week to speed up the country's response to the outbreak, with health officials intending to increase the nation's vaccination supply by 1.8 million doses of the Jynneos monkeypox vaccine.
Officials are also offering more resources to local governments to assist in the transition to a new sort of injection in order to extend out vaccination supply. Earlier this month, the United States The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issued an emergency use authorization, allowing healthcare practitioners to split vaccine doses in order to immunize up to five times as many people against the disease.
Vaccine doses can now be given to high-risk people intradermally, or between the layers of skin, rather than subcutaneously, or beneath the skin, as previously. This allows caregivers to extract up to five doses from a typical one-dose vial.
