WHO declares monkeypox outbreak over - just as virus resurges in Chicago trends now
The World Health Organization has declared the monkeypox global emergency over, just as this year's first cluster of cases emerges in America's third largest city.
Chicago has recorded 12 confirmed and one probable case of the virus spread by sexual contact between April 17 and May 5, the latest dates available. For comparison, the city has been averaging less than one case a week since February.
Nine of the new infections were in men who are fully vaccinated, city health officials said. None of the infected people have been hospitalized.
Raising the alarm, they warned of a 'resurgence' of the disease, now known as mpox, that is spread via sexual contact and has so far sickened 30,000 Americans — the most in the world — and led to 42 deaths.
Last year the world was put on high alert when the virus began to spread, largely among gay and bisexual men in the US and Europe. But cases then receded in late summer.
Shown above are the mpox cases recorded by week in Chicago. The data highlights an uptick after cases previously flatlining at one or none per week since December
World Health Organization director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has declared an end to the emergency over mpox (pictured in December at the WHO headquarters in Geneva)
Mpox sparked alarm among health officials early last year when it began to spread rapidly among gay and bisexual men, reaching a peak of 450 cases a day in August.
But infections appeared to have tapered off amid boosted awareness of the disease and a hurried vaccination program.
The tally dropped below the milestone of ten cases per day in December and has been tracking at less than two every 24 hours since February.
In total, 30,395 Americans were diagnosed with mpox and 42 people died from the disease.
But the sudden uptick in Chicago has alarmed officials that the disease may again be spreading undetected, even among those who were vaccinated.
All the patients were men aged about 34 years old on average, they said in an alert released this week. Of the nine with travel history available, four had recently visited New York City, New Orleans or Mexico.
Thirty-three percent of patients were also living with HIV, while one was diagnosed with syphilis.
Dr Allison Arwady, the city's commissioner of public health, said this week in a Facebook live: 'Most weeks we didn't see a single mpox case, maybe one or two in a higher week.
'But just these last couple of weeks we saw two, then five,
