Guwahati: The World Health Organisation (WHO) announced on Monday that it Monkey pox will now be referred to as “mpox.”
WHO will start adopting the new preferred name “mpox” as a synonym for monkey pox following several meetings with international experts, the organisation stated. Both names will be used simultaneously for one year while “monkeypox” is phased out.”
Reports state that when the disease outbreak grew earlier this year few racist and stigmatising languages were reported to the organisation.
Due to these occurrences being reported online and in some communities a number of people and countries voiced their concerns and encouraged WHO to provide a means to proceed with changing the name.
Based on consultations and further discussions with WHO’s Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the organization recommended the following:
- Adoption of the new synonym mpox in English for the disease.
- Mpox will become a preferred term, replacing monkeypox, after a transition period of one year. This serves to mitigate the concerns raised by experts about confusion caused by a name change in the midst of a global outbreak. It also gives time to complete the ICD update process and to update WHO publications.
- The synonym mpox will be included in the ICD-10 online in the coming days. It will be a part of the official 2023 release of ICD-11, which is the current global standard for health data, clinical documentation and statistical aggregation.
- The term “monkeypox” will remain a searchable term in ICD, to match historic information.
It should be noted that since May, cases of the disease have been documented in endemic and non-endemic nations alike, as well as in a number of non-endemic nations.
The majorities of reported cases to date have mostly but not exclusively, involved men who have sex with men and have been discovered through sexual health or other health services in primary or secondary health-care facilities. According to WHO’s statement from last month, monkeypox continues to meet the requirements for a public health emergency of international concern.