• On July 23, 2022, amid a rapid rise in monkeypox cases across the globe, Dr. Tedros Adhanom, Director General of World Health Organization (WHO) declared the disease outbreak a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC).
  • First discovered in 1958, in monkeys at the Statens Serum Institute in Denmark, monkeypox is a zoonotic virus that can infect humans as well as other animals, including rodents and other primate species.
  • The number of confirmed monkeypox cases increased more than 70% from late June through early July 2022, with a majority of the case burden being in Europe. There is, however, limited knowledge about the source and transmission routes of the 2022 outbreak as well as the changes in the virus that helped it infect humans more than before, making monkeypox a disease of global public health importance.