'Mpox is not the new COVID,' says WHO, as it urges greater solidarity with Africa amid outbreak

By Ciara Linnane

'The need for a coordinated response is now greatest in the Africa region,' says World Health Organization's European director

Mpox is not the new COVID-19, the World Health Organization said on Tuesday, while urging greater solidarity with people and communities in Africa who are currently most at risk of the disease.

While more research is needed to fully understand the latest strain of the highly infectious disease, far more is known about mpox than was initially understood about COVID, Hans Kluge, the WHO's European director, told reporters at a briefing.

The two illnesses can't be compared, Kluge said - regardless of whether it's mpox clade 1, which is currently circulating in East and Central Africa, or mpox clade 2, the strain that was behind the 2022 outbreak that initially impacted Europe and has continued to circulate on that continent since.

A clade is a group of organisms that are understood to have derived from a common ancestor.

The WHO declared mpox a public-health emergency of international concern last Wednesday. That was after the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention had declared mpox a continental emergency.

Cases have been confirmed among children and adults in more than a dozen countries and few vaccine doses are available, the Associated Press has reported. The Africa CDC has recorded more than 500 deaths and called for international help to stop the spread of the virus.

"The need for a coordinated response is now greatest in the Africa region," said Kluge.

Europe "must choose to act in solidarity - solidarity with individuals and communities impacted by mpox, by working directly with them to take charge of their own health," he added.

The first case of mpox reported in a human was detected 50 years ago in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the center of the current outbreak.

The first outbreak in the U.S. was in 2003, when approximately 43 people in six states had confirmed cases as a result of contact with pet prairie dogs who had been housed near imported animals from Ghana, according to Raymond James analysts in a note from 2022.

Last Thursday, Sweden became the first country outside Africa to confirm mpox, found in a person with a travel history to Central Africa, according to the WHO. On Monday, Pakistani health officials said a case had been detected there last week, but it was a different strain than the one in the DRC, as Voice of America reported.

Mpox is characterized initially by a high temperature, headache, muscle aches, swollen glans, shivering, exhaustion and joint pain. A rash-which may be located on hands, feet, chest, face, mouth or near the genitals-typically appears one to five days later, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The Africa CDC has said that more than 96% of all cases and deaths are in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Cases are up 160% and deaths are up 19% compared with the same period last year. So far, there have been more than 14,000 cases and 524 people have died.

In 2022, the WHO declared mpox to be a global emergency after it spread to more than 70 countries that had not previously reported mpox, mostly affecting gay and bisexual men. In that outbreak, fewer than 1% of people died.

That was thanks to stepped-up surveillance, investigating case contacts, modifying behavior in the affected communities and vaccination, Kluge noted.

"Are we going to go in lockdown in the WHO European region, [as if the illness] is another COVID-19? The answer is clearly no,'" he said.

The stocks of companies that make vaccines or are developing therapies to treat mpox have rallied since the WHO's announcement last week.

The leader is Bavarian Nordic (DK:BAVA) (BVNRY), the Danish company that has the only U.S.- and European-approved vaccine for mpox. The company is seeking approval to immunize adolescents against the illness. Its stock is up 62% in August.

GeoVax Labs Inc. (GOVX) is developing an MVA vaccine for mpox - one that uses the modified vaccinia Ankara virus as a vector or platform to deliver antigens to the immune system, E.F. Hutton analyst Jason Kolbert said in a note published Monday.

GeoVax's stock has gained 185% in August to date, even as it's selling off on Tuesday after announcing a stock sale.

Two other players worth mentioning are Emergent BioSolutions Inc. (EBS), which in 2022 acquired the rights to a smallpox treatment called Tembexa, which was developed by Chimerix Inc. (CMRX) and may be effective against mpox; and Siga Technologies Inc. (SIGA), which is developing an mpox antiviral.

Siga reported Friday that a trial it iss conducting in the Democratic Republic of the Congo failed to meet its main goal of reducing lesions.

Emergent's stock has climbed 297% in the year to date, while Siga shares have gained 58%. The S&P 500 SPX was up 17% in the same period.

For more, read: GeoVax's stock soars 43% to lead rally in companies developing mpox treatments

-Ciara Linnane

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08-21-24 0842ET

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