The Biden administration is declaring a public health emergency for the monkey pox outbreak in the United States, which now has more virus infections than any other country in the world The Secretary of Health and Human Services, Xavier Becerra, announced the decision Thursday in an informational meeting with the main public health officials.
“This public health emergency will allow us to explore additional strategies to get vaccines and treatments faster to affected communities. And it will allow us to get more data from jurisdictions so we can effectively track and attack this outbreak,” Robert Fenton. the White House’s newly appointed national monkeypox response coordinator, said at the briefing.
Over the past decade, national emergency declarations like this one have been made done previously just for the COVID-19 pandemic, the opioid crisisand the Zika virus outbreak in 2017.
As it did with COVID-19, Becerra’s decision to declare an emergency could discover a wide range of flexibility in funding and regulations to respond to the spread of monkeypox.
A related determination would open the door to Food and Drug Administration approval emergency use authorizations that might relieve it access to treatments and vaccines for the monkey pox outbreak.
For example, a spokesperson for Becerra’s department confirmed to CBS News earlier this month that it was working to see if millions of previously stored (and now expired) doses of the Jynneos monkeypox vaccine could be implemented under an emergency use authorization.
Samples of the expired doses have been sent to manufacturer Bavarian Nordic for testing, although the spokesman said it was “highly unlikely that these doses remain viable”.
Officials have said for weeks they were mulling the move as the number of cases has risen and demand for shots has far outstripped supply nationwide.
The move comes as a growing number of jurisdictions, including several states and citiesas well as the World Health Organization all have considered the outbreak an emergency.
This week, President Biden, too touched officials of the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention lead the country’s monkey pox response of the White House.
Wednesday, the CDC said had counted at least 6,617 infections across the country. All but two states, Montana and Wyoming, have reported detecting at least one infection.
Most infections are still believed to be spread through intimate contact between men who have sex with men. Although no deaths have been reported, patients often endure sometimes excruciatingly painful rashes and lesions that can last for weeks.
Doctors have also responded to a handful of infections in other groups at higher risk of serious illness, such as pregnant woman i small children.
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