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On Aug. 14, 2024, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared Mpox, previously known as monkeypox, a public health emergency following recent outbreaks in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and other countries worldwide.
These countries are Burundi, Cameroon, the Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Kenya, Liberia, Mozambique, Nigeria, Pakistan, the Philippines, the Republic of the Congo, Rwanda, South Africa, Sweden, Thailand and Uganda.
Amidst this outbreak, the term “Monkeypox” is still in use by many, including some news reporting platforms, as seen here and here, despite WHO’s change in 2022.
Recall in Nov. 2022, the WHO recommended that Monkeypox be called Mpox going forward with a one-year window period (Nov. 2022- Nov. 2023) for both names to be used simultaneously while “monkeypox” is phased out.
History of Mpox Outbreak Outbreak
The Mpox virus was discovered in Denmark (1958) in monkeys kept for research. The first reported human case of Mpox was a nine-month-old boy in DRC in 1970.
Between 1981 and 1986, 37 documented cases of monkeypox were reported in the DRC, formerly Zaire. The largest outbreak was reported from the same area between Feb. 1996 and Feb. 1997.
In 2003, an outbreak in the United States of America was linked to imported wild animals (Clade II). Since 2005, thousands of suspected cases have been reported in the DRC annually. In 2017, Mpox re-emerged in Nigeria and continued to spread among people across the country and travellers to other destinations until 2021.
Mpox resurfaced between 2022 and 2023, leading to a global outbreak that affected over 110 countries. This outbreak was driven by human-to-human transmission through sexual contact. Within this period, the WHO reported over 90,000 cases and 150 deaths.
Since 2022, an epidemic of Mpox caused by monkeypox virus (MPXV) clade IIb has been ongoing globally. This has affected many countries outside the African continent that had never reported Mpox.
Why the name change?
The WHO, under the International Classification of Diseases (ICD) and the WHO Family of International Health-Related Classifications, is responsible for assigning names to new and existing diseases through a consultative process that includes WHO Member States.
During the 2022 outbreak, WHO noted that racist and stigmatising language around the name “monkeypox” was observed online and in some communities. This concern was raised by public and private individuals and countries who asked the WHO to propose a way forward to change the name.
In 2015, the World Health Organization (WHO), in collaboration with the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), identified best practices for the naming of new human diseases. According to these best practices, new disease names should be given to minimise the unnecessary negative impact of names on trade, travel, tourism, or animal welfare and avoid offence to any cultural, social, national, regional, professional, or ethnic groups.
Seeing that the name monkeypox was given in 1970 before the publication of WHO best practices in naming diseases, WHO, following the ICD update process, held consultations to gather views from various experts, countries, and the general public on new name suggestions.
Following this, the WHO recommended;
- The adoption of the new synonym Mpox in English for the disease.
- Mpox has become a preferred term, replacing monkeypox after a one-year transition period, to mitigate concerns about confusion caused by the name change and to give ample time to complete the ICD update process and update WHO publications.
- The synonym Mpox will be included in the ICD-10 online in the coming days and will be part of the official 2023 release of ICD-11.
- “monkeypox” will remain searchable in ICD to match historical information.
The variants of this disease were also renamed from the Congo Basin (Central African) clade to Clade One (I) and from the West African clade to Clade Two (II). Additionally, it was agreed that Clade II consists of two subclades: IIa and IIb.
Wise conclusion