MPOX: Kenya steps up surveillance of suspected cases after recording Uganda’s could have been 1st case

NAIROBI | Xinhua | The Kenyan Ministry of Health said on Friday that it has ramped up surveillance measures across the country to detect all suspected cases of mpox, which has emerged as a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC) amid a surge in cross-border transmissions.

Health Cabinet Secretary Deborah Barasa said the ministry has galvanized the public health emergency operation centers and established incident management teams across Kenya as part of response measures to prevent new cases of the disease.

“No new confirmed cases of mpox have been reported in the country since the first confirmed case,” Barasa said in a statement issued in the national capital of Nairobi.

The statement came after the World Health Organization (WHO) declared the disease a PHEIC and called for a coordinated international response to stop the outbreak of mpox and save lives. The move by the UN health agency followed an outbreak of the viral infection in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and its spread to neighboring countries in Africa.

Barasa said Kenya has reported only one case of mpox of a driver who traveled from Uganda to the Kenyan coastal city of Mombasa and then to Rwanda via Tanzania through Taita Taveta in southeastern Kenya through a one-stop border point. She said the health personnel have since screened 12 persons who came into contact with the driver and another six different suspected cases, all of whom tested negative for the disease.

“This individual has since made full recovery and is now well,” Barasa said, adding that the ministry will continue to issue advisories on the status of the disease and sensitize health workers on how to identify the disease as well as infection prevention and control measures.

Mpox is an infectious disease caused by the monkeypox virus that is spread through close contact, including fever, swelling of the lymph nodes, sore throat, muscle aches, skin rash, and back pain.

According to the WHO, several outbreaks of different clades of mpox have occurred in different countries, with different modes of transmission and different levels of risk. ■