The World Health Organization (WHO) changed the name of the disease “monkeypox” to “mpox” on Monday to avoid racist and stigmatizing language as happened when the outbreak spread earlier this year.
“After a series of consultations with world experts, the WHO will begin to use the new term ‘mpox’ as a synonym for ‘monkey pox’,” the WHO said in a statement.
According to the WHO, the two names can be used simultaneously for one year, after which the monkeypox name will be dropped.
“This serves to assuage concerns raised by experts about confusion caused by a name change in the midst of a global outbreak and also allows time to complete the process of updating the International Classification of Diseases and updating WHO publications.” .
According to the organization, when the “monkey pox” outbreak spread earlier this year, “racist and stigmatizing language was observed and reported to the WHO on the Internet, in other contexts and in some communities.”
“In several meetings, public and private, various people and countries expressed their concern and asked the WHO to propose a way to change the name,” he stresses.
WHO, in line with the process of updating the International Classification of Diseases, conducted consultations to gather views from a range of experts, as well as countries and the general public, who were invited to submit suggestions for new names.
Various advisory bodies were consulted during the consultation process, including experts from the Medical and Scientific and Classification and Statistics Advisory Committees, which included representatives of government authorities from 45 different countries.
Based on these additional consultations and discussions with WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO recommends the adoption of the new English synonym “mpox” for the disease.
The term “mpox” will be included in the official list of diseases that the WHO will update in 2023.
According to WHO, considerations for recommendations included rationale, scientific adequacy, extent of current use, pronunciation, use in different languages, lack of geographic or zoological references, and ease of retrieval of historical scientific information.
Normally, the process of updating the International Classification of Diseases can take several years, but in this case the process was expedited, following standard steps.
The WHO will adopt the term “mpox” in its communications and encourages others to follow this recommendation, “to minimize any continued negative impact of the current name and adoption of the new name.”
Since the beginning of the outbreak in Europe, which has spread to other countries such as the United States, Canada, Brazil, more than 81,000 cases (55 of which are fatal) have been confirmed in some 100 countries, including Portugal, with 948 cases.
WHO/Europe supported civil society organizations with information and guidance throughout the outbreak and disseminating good practices, sharing learning from countries with creative and effective response strategies, such as the creation of a rapid response team in Portugal, which he was one of the first. European countries to show signs of stabilization in the transmission of the disease.
Source: TSF
