© 2024 WYPR
WYPR 88.1 FM Baltimore WYPF 88.1 FM Frederick WYPO 106.9 FM Ocean City
Donate
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations
WYPO 106.9 Eastern Shore is off the air due to routine tower work being done daily from 8a-5p. We hope to restore full broadcast days by 12/15. All streams are operational

Mpox will not be renewed as a public health emergency next year

By Ashley Ahn
Published December 3, 2022 at 6:00 AM EST
Health workers sit at a check-in table at a pop-up mpox vaccination clinic which opened today by the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health at the West Hollywood Library on August 3, 2022 in West Hollywood, California. California Governor Gavin Newsom declared a state of emergency on August 1st over the mpox outbreak.
Mario Tama
/
Getty Images
Health workers sit at a check-in table at a pop-up mpox vaccination clinic which opened today by the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health at the West Hollywood Library on August 3, 2022 in West Hollywood, California. California Governor Gavin Newsom declared a state of emergency on August 1st over the mpox outbreak.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services announced it would not renew mpox, the virus formerly known as monkeypox, as a public health emergency after January 31, 2023, following a drop in cases.

Mpox cases, which peaked in August with a seven-day average of 459 new cases, fell steadily over the past months to an average of seven cases by the end of November.

"From the outset of the mpox outbreak, the Administration pulled every lever to stop the spread of this virus," wrote Xavier Becerra, secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, in a Friday press release. "Given the low number of cases today, HHS does not expect that it needs to renew the emergency declaration when it ends on January 31, 2023."

The Department of Health and Human Services declared mpox a public health emergency in early August, with more than 7,500 cases confirmed.

The U.S. soon saw a slower rate of new cases beginning mid-August, making health officials cautiously optimistic soon after the announcement of a public health emergency. The seven-day average of new cases dropped 20% from Aug. 10 to Aug. 26.

A change in behavior, particularly among LGBTQ communities, helped curb the spread of mpox, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. About half of respondents to a CDC survey said they had reduced "their number of sex partners, one-time sexual encounters, and use of dating apps because of the monkeypox outbreak," according to a report released in September.

The vast majority of mpox cases are related to male-to-male sexual contact, according to the World Health Organization.

As of Dec. 2, a total of nearly 30,000 cases and 19 deaths have been confirmed in the U.S. and about 82,000 cases globally.

"We won't take our foot off the gas – we will continue to monitor the case trends closely and encourage all at-risk individuals to get a free vaccine," Becerra wrote. "As we move into the next phase of this effort, the Biden-Harris Administration continues working closely with jurisdictions and partners to monitor trends, especially in communities that have been disproportionately affected."

Copyright 2022 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

Tags
NPR News
Ashley Ahn
Ashley Ahn is an intern for the Digital News and Graphics desks. She previously covered the rollout of COVID-19 vaccines for CNN's health and medical unit and the trial of Ahmaud Arbery's killers for CNN's Atlanta News Bureau. She also wrote pieces for USA TODAY and served as the Executive Editor of her college's student newspaper, The Daily Pennsylvanian. Recently graduated from the University of Pennsylvania, Ahn is pursuing a master's degree in computer science at Columbia University.