The World Health Organization held a meeting of the expert committee on monkeypox to determine whether the current increase in the number of cases constitutes a public health emergency of international concern.

The Director-General of the World Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said during a press conference, "Whatever the committee's recommendation, the World Health Organization will continue to do everything it can to stop monkeypox and save lives."

The emergency committee will also be tasked with assessing the epidemiological indicators after the situation worsened in recent weeks with more than 14,500 cases recorded in 70 countries, according to figures released by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

- 98% of cases are among men

Dr. Rosamund Lewis, the lead monkeypox expert at the World Health Organization, said that outside Africa "men constitute 99% of reported cases," and that 98% of these "have multiple, new, or unknown partners," according to Agence France-Presse.

It is noted that in the first meeting held on June 23, the majority of experts recommended that Tedros should not declare a public health emergency of international concern.

- Few vaccines

The UN health agency is working in parallel with member states and experts to strengthen research and development efforts on the virus.

Tedros said, "Although we are seeing a downward trend in some countries, other countries are still facing an increase in cases, and six countries reported detecting their first cases last week."

He also added that "in some of these countries, access to diagnostics and vaccines is much weaker, making it difficult to track and stop the spread of the disease," while there is not a large quantity of vaccines available.