Tag Archives: WHO

The monkeypox outbreak continues to represent a global health emergency, which is the World Health Organization’s highest level of alert, the UN agency’s Emergency Committee said on Tuesday. The WHO label, a “public health emergency of international concern (PHEIC)”, is designed to trigger a coordinated international response and could unlock …

It is possible to eliminate the monkeypox outbreak in Europe, World Health Organization officials said on Tuesday, highlighting evidence that case counts are slowing in a handful of countries. There are encouraging signs of a sustained week-on-week decline in the onset of cases in many European countries, including France, Germany, …

Health authorities in the Democratic Republic of the Congo declared a resurgence of the Ebola virus after a new case was confirmed in the country’s eastern province of North Kivu. The new case was identified after samples from a 46-year-old woman in Beni, a town located in North Kivu, tested …

The World Health Organization (WHO) on Thursday recommended the use of French drugmaker Valneva’s COVID-19 vaccine. The UN agency also recommended the use of a second booster dose for some individuals at high risk of severe disease. However, that does not constitute a general recommendation of vaccinating all adults, and …

Global experts have agreed to refer to monkeypox virus variants by Roman numerals

The UAE’s Ministry of Health reported on Tuesday the first case of monkeypox, becoming the first Gulf country to detect a case of the disease. The patient is a 29-year-old visitor from a West African country and she is receiving the required medical care in the UAE, WAM added. Monkeypox …

The World Health Organization’s (WHO) members re-elected Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus as Director-General by a strong majority for another five years, the president of the World Health Assembly said on Tuesday. The vote by secret ballot, announced by Ahmed Robleh Abdilleh from Djibouti at a major annual meeting, was seen as …

The World Health Organization does not have evidence that the monkeypox virus has mutated, a senior executive at the U.N. agency said on Monday, noting the infectious disease that has been endemic in the west and central Africa has tended not to change. Rosamund Lewis, head of the smallpox secretariat …

A handful of cases of monkeypox have now been reported or are suspected in Britain, Portugal, Spain, and the United States. The outbreaks are raising alarm because the viral disease, which spreads through close contact and was first found in monkeys, mostly occurs in the west and central Africa, and …

The United States has now recorded more than 1 million COVID-19 deaths, according to a Reuters tally, crossing a once-unthinkable milestone about two years after the first cases upended everyday life and quickly transformed it.

The World Health Organization is estimating that nearly 15 million people were killed either by the coronavirus or by its impact on overwhelmed health systems in the past two years, more than double the official death toll of 6 million. Most of the fatalities were in Southeast Asia, Europe, and …

The number of cases of unknown origin in children now stands at 169 reported in 12 countries. At least one child has died after an increase in hepatitis cases, the World Health Organisation (WHO) has said. The number of cases of unknown origin in children now stands at 169 reported …

A second Global COVID-19 Summit will be held virtually next month for countries to discuss efforts to end the pandemic and prepare for future health threats, according to a joint statement on Monday. “The emergence and spread of new variants, like Omicron, have reinforced the need for a strategy aimed …

The global average of true infection numbers is believed to be 16 times higher than the number of confirmed reported cases – but could have been 97 times higher in Africa, WHO says. More than two-thirds of people living in Africa may have contracted COVID-19 over the past two years, …

The simultaneous circulation of the Delta and Omicron variants of the coronavirus is creating a “tsunami of cases”, World Health Organization (WHO) director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told a news briefing on Wednesday. “Delta and Omicron are now twin threats driving up cases to record numbers, leading to spikes in hospitalization …

The World Health Organization does not yet have enough data on the new Omicron variant of the coronavirus to say if it is more transmissible than the Delta variant, an official said on Wednesday, almost a month after South Africa first raised the alarm about its emergence. “We have not …

The Omicron variant of the coronavirus is spreading faster than the Delta variant and is causing infections in people already vaccinated or who have recovered from the COVID-19 disease, the head of the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Monday. “There is now consistent evidence that Omicron is spreading significantly …

The Netherlands went into lockdown on Sunday and the possibility of more COVID-19 restrictions being imposed ahead of the Christmas and New Year holidays loomed over several European countries as the Omicron variant spreads rapidly. In the United States, White House medical adviser Dr. Anthony Fauci urged people traveling to …

A yet-to-be-identified disease has killed at least 89 people in Fangak in the South Sudan’s state of Jonglei, a World Health Organization (WHO) official told the BBC. The mysterious deaths happened in an area recently hit by flooding. Local health officials have ruled out cholera as the cause, the British …

The World Health Organization (WHO) recommended on Thursday that people who are immunocompromised or received an inactivated COVID-19 vaccine should receive a booster dose to protect against waning immunity. Many countries have been rolling out booster shots, targeting the elderly and people with underlying health issues, but worries about the …