WHO urges swift response as DRC hit by mutated mpox strain

The spread of mpox in Africa needs to be addressed urgently, the World Health Organization has warned, as more deaths were reported from a mutated strain of the virus in the Democratic Republic of Congo. 

Mpox, formerly known as monkeypox, from the same family as smallpox, causes flu-like symptoms and pus-filled lesions. Most cases are mild but it can also be deadly. 

"There is a critical need to address the recent surge in mpox cases in Africa," Rosamund Lewis, the WHO's technical lead for mpox, told journalists on Tuesday. 

A dangerous new strain of mpox was spreading quickly along the eastern border of the DRC and was "incredibly worrying", scientists warned separately. 

A mutated version of the clade I mpox endemic in Congo for decades had fatality rates of around 5 percent in adults and 10 percent in children said biomedical engineer John Claude Udahemuka, who has been working on an outbreak in the hard-to-reach South Kivu province. 

Hundreds dead

This year, roughly 8,600 mpox cases have been reported in the DRC with 410 deaths, Cris Kacita, the doctor in charge of operations in the country's mpox control programme, told Reuters last week. 

"At the rate things are going, we risk becoming a source of cases for other countries," said Kacita. South Kivu borders Rwanda and Burundi. 

In South Kivu, researchers said the new strain was spreading partly by sexual contact among men and women, and particularly among sex workers.  

It is also being spread by non-sexual contact in places including schools. 

In 2022 the WHO declared a public health emergency after an outbreak in Europe and the US that centred on the gay community. 

It was brought under control by vaccinating vulnerable groups, but the vaccines were not available in the DRC. 

(with newswires)