The Federal Ministry of Health through the Port Health Services has made it mandatory for travellers arriving in Nigeria to declare their health status via a form in the wake of the resurgence of mpox across Africa.
The form will serve as a measure to track potential importation of the mpox diseases, formerly known as monkeypox, preventing it from becoming a public health threat in Nigeria, the ministry stated on its website.
The Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC) may declare mpox a public health emergency this week over the growing outbreak on the continent, Jean Kaseya, head of Africa CDC, said during an online media briefing last Wednesday.
About 16 countries have been hit by mpox resurgence, according to the centre, with some 38,465 cases and 1,456 deaths recorded since January 2022.
As of July 14, the Nigeria Center for Disease Control and Prevention report shows that 102 new suspected cases were reported from 18 states without any deaths recorded in 2024.
“We are moving from two outbreaks per week to three new outbreaks per week,” Kaseya said, adding that there was a shortage of vaccines on the continent.
Mpox is a viral illness caused by the monkeypox virus, a species of the genus Orthopoxvirus. It can be transmitted to humans through physical contact with someone who is infectious, with contaminated materials, or with infected animals. The disease causes fever, muscular aches and large boil-like skin lesions.
The World Health Organization announced last Wednesday it was urgently convening an expert committee to advise on whether the growing mpox outbreak in Africa should be declared an international emergency.
The WHO director-general announced that he had triggered the Emergency Use Listing (EUL) process of mpox vaccines given worrying trends in the spread of the disease.
The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) is facing a serious level of growth in the outbreak which has expanded outside the country.
A new viral strain, which first emerged in September 2023, has for the first time been detected outside DRC.
The EUL procedure is an emergency use authorisation process, specifically developed to expedite the availability of unlicensed medical products like vaccines needed in public health emergencies.
WHO has requested manufacturers to submit data to ensure that the vaccines are safe, effective, of assured quality and suitable for the target populations.
Granting of an EUL is expected to accelerate vaccine access, particularly for those lower-income countries which have not yet issued their national regulatory approval.
The EUL also enables partners including Gavi and UNICEF to procure vaccines for distribution.
“The committee will meet as soon as possible and will be made up of independent experts from a range of relevant disciplines from around the world,” WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told a press conference.
The committee will advise him on whether the outbreak represents a public health emergency of international concern (PHEIC) — the highest alarm the WHO can sound
