Monrovia – The National Public Health Institute of Liberia (NPHIL) has reported an outbreak of the Monkeypox virus (Mpox) in several countries within the World Health Organization (WHO) African Region, predominantly in Central and West Africa.
By Selma Lomax. [email protected]
The WHO has classified this Mpox outbreak as a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC) under the International Health Regulations (2005) (IHR).
According to NPHIL, Liberia has confirmed five cases of Mpox in three counties since the beginning of 2024. Recently, new cases have also been confirmed in neighboring countries such as Nigeria and Côte d’Ivoire.
Mpox is caused by the Monkeypox virus, which belongs to the same family of viruses as smallpox. It can be transmitted through direct skin-to-skin contact, sexual contact with bodily fluids or lesions around the anus, rectum, or vagina from an infected person, and through respiratory secretions and droplets, among other means. Symptoms of Mpox include fever, chills, headache, swollen lymph nodes, muscle aches, and more.
Noting the nature of this outbreak and its rapid spread over several countries, the National Public Health Institute of Liberia (NPHIL) will heighten its surveillance system, strengthen its outbreak preparedness plan and will work in collaboration with the Ministry of Health to activate measures and specific response mechanism so as to address any impending outbreak of Mpox in Liberia.
NPHIL said in a statement issued through its new Director General, Dr. Dougbeh Chris Nyan.
Meanwhile, NPHIL has urged the public to take preventive measures, including regular hand-washing, avoiding sexual contact with persons suspected of having Mpox symptoms, avoiding close contact with persons suspected of Mpox, avoiding contact with animals, and promptly reporting to the nearest medical facility if any Mpox symptoms are experienced or observed.
How prepared is Liberia?
Since Liberia reported the first case of Mpox early this year, the disease has been reported in several other central and western African countries: Cameroon, Central African Republic, Cote d’Ivoire, Gabon, Nigeria, Republic of the Congo, and Sierra Leone. Most infections are in the DRC.
In Liberia, though no death has been reported, it seems many don’t know much of the disease. Medical experts believe the Ministry of Health needs to anticipate what is going to happen and be prepared.
“It’s unlikely to be a mutation because Mpox virus is a DNA virus, which does not change much and has much less propensity for mutation and variant generation, like SARS-CoV-2, which is an RNA virus,” Aker Bleah, a medical doctor told FrontPageAfrica.
Dr. Bleah said to be on the safe side, the Ministry of Health should do sequencing so as to get a firsthand look at what to expect and be able compare with what they have in Europe or other African countries.
Dr. Bleah added that the Ministry of Health should also make communities aware that this is going on. “We have already reported three cases. This information is enough to alert us that someone was infected with Mpox through contact. We should conduct contact tracing to determine if there are more cases,” he said.
“It should also be used as an opportunity to get information across to our people and make them aware that we still have this disease and provide prevention and control guidelines. If somebody has a rash, that person should report to the hospital for further investigation and hospital staff should put in place infection prevention and control procedures – including wearing gloves and other protective materials.”
Dr. Bleah said to avoid being infected and becoming a source of infection to others, health workers who are dealing with infected people should take standard infection prevention and control precautions: hand washing, personal protective equipment, respiratory hygiene, cough etiquette and safe injection practices. The message is that of awareness and preparedness, but not panic.
And that is the campaign Dr. Nyan, and his team have started. In a brief interview with FrontPageAfrica late Thursday night said Liberia is prepared. “We have a very robust surveillance team. We are very comfortable if there is any outbreak at a scale that is not just sporadic, we will be able to detect those,” he said.
“We have a detection mechanism but we will definitely need to augment it by having more reagents on hand chemicals and more materials. we have the technology to detect but we have to need more materials in order to mount an effective and robust detection.”
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