That marks a significant departure from the disease's typical pattern of spread in Central and Western Africa, where people are mainly infected by animals like wild rodents and primates, and outbreaks have not spilled across borders. "The first sequencing of the virus shows that the strain is not different from the strains we can find in endemic countries and (this outbreak) is probably due more to a change in human behaviour," said Dr Sylvie Briand, WHO's director of pandemic and epidemic diseases.Įarlier this week, a top adviser to WHO told AP that the outbreak in Europe, US, Israel, Australia, and beyond was likely linked to sex at two recent sex rave parties in Spain and Belgium. Spain alone has reported almost half of all the world's cases with 98 infections by Friday. Nearly 200 Monkeypox infections have been reported in over 20 countries not usually known to have outbreaks of the disease.
The WHO also confirmed there is no evidence so far that any genetic changes in the virus are responsible for the unprecedented outbreak. The World Health Organization (WHO) on Friday said that the current Monkeypox outbreak is "controllable" and added that it's working towards creating a stockpile of vaccines and medicines for targeted distribution in affected areas, similar to WHO's distribution during outbreaks of yellow fever, meningitis, and cholera.