The Biden administration plans to declare monkeypox a public health emergency in the coming days, following the World Health Organization decision last weekend, sources claim.
According to the law that specifies how and when the federal government can declare such an emergency, HHS might then take several actions, including obtaining fresh funding and assigning new people, as reported by Politico.
The announcement of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is expected by the end of the week, according to the sources with access to the situation. However, the choice has not yet been made, and an HHS representative stated that the agency continues to "explore options."
According to a White House spokeswoman, there are currently no updates as of current reporting.
As health professionals in the US and at the WHO indicated this week that there is little risk to the general population, Biden officials have been debating for days whether to declare monkeypox a public health emergency.
In recent years, the HHS has proclaimed several public health emergencies, including COVID-19 and the opioid crisis.
Tom Inglesby, director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security at the Bloomberg School of Public Health, noted: "We're having a lot of challenges around the country with their rate of rise in terms of new cases. It isn't an emergency posing a ... high threat to the general population. But it's still moving ... and has the potential to spread to additional vulnerable communities.00"0
More Monkeypox Vaccine Rollout Soon
Meanwhile, AP News reported US health authorities announced Wednesday that almost 800,000 of the monkeypox vaccine will soon be made available for distribution.
The development comes amid mounting criticism that the government has been too slow to distribute the vaccine, thus squandering the chance to end what may soon develop into a persistent infectious disease.
The Food and Drug Administration declared almost two weeks ago that the factory in Denmark where Bavarian Nordic fills vaccine vials had undergone all required inspections. On Wednesday, the FDA announced via Twitter that the certification was complete. Since the dosages arrived in the country, they would be ready for distribution whenever the "manufacturing changes" were finalized.
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More than 310,000 doses of the two-shot Jynneos vaccine were already distributed to state and local health departments. However, clinics in New York, San Francisco, and other significant cities claim they still lack sufficient injections to satisfy demand.
What To Know About Monkeypox
Outside of the central and west African nations where it is prevalent, monkeypox, which produces flu-like symptoms and skin lesions, has been primarily spreading among men who have sex with men in the present outbreak. The primary method of disease transmission is close contact.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention revealed that there were over 4,600 cases of monkeypox in the country. With the majority of infections occurring among males who have sex with other men, New York City continues to be the focal point of the outbreak.
More than 14,000 cases of monkeypox have been reported so far this year in more than 60 different countries, with five fatalities occurring in Africa, as reported by The Guardian.
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