WHO eyes renaming monkeypox over stigma worries

LONDON: The World Health Organization (WHO) has announced it was holding an open forum to rename the monkeypox disease after some critics raised concerns that the name could be derogatory or have racist connotations.

In a statement on Friday, the United Nations health agency said it had also renamed two families, or clades, of the virus, using Roman numerals instead of geographic areas, to avoid stigmatization. The version of the disease formerly known as the Congo Basin will now be known as Clade one or I and the West Africa clade will be known as Clade two or II.

The new names for the clades should be used immediately, it added.

The WHO said the decision was made following a meeting of scientists this week and in line with current best practices for naming diseases, which aims to “avoid causing offense to any cultural, social, national, regional, professional, or ethnic groups, and minimize any negative impact on trade, travel, tourism or animal welfare.”

Numerous other diseases, including Japanese encephalitis, Marburg virus, Spanish influenza and Middle Eastern Respiratory Syndrome have been named after the geographic areas where they first arose or were identified. The agency has not publicly suggested changing any of those names.

Monkeypox was first named in 1958, when research monkeys in Denmark were observed to have a “pox-like” disease, although they are not thought to be the animal reservoir.

The WHO said it was also opening a way for the public to suggest new names for monkeypox, but did not say when any new name would be announced.

To date, there have been more than 31,000 cases of monkeypox identified globally since May, with the majority of those outside of Africa. Monkeypox has been endemic in parts of Central and Western Africa for decades and was not known to trigger large outbreaks beyond the continent until May.

The WHO declared the global spread of monkeypox to be an international emergency in July and the United States declared its own epidemic to be a national emergency earlier this month.

Outside of Africa, 98 percent of cases are in men who have sex with men. With only a limited global supply of vaccines, authorities are racing to stop monkeypox before it becomes entrenched as a new disease.

According to the WHO’s situation report on the monkeypox outbreak on Wednesday, there are now 27,814 laboratory-confirmed cases and 11 deaths in 89 countries and regions, with Europe and the Americas being hit the hardest.