GENEVA, June 14 — The WHO said today it would hold an emergency meeting next week to determine whether to classify the global monkeypox outbreak as a public health emergency of international concern.
The emergency committee will meet on June 23 to discuss the designation, which is the highest alarm the UN agency can sound. While 72 deaths have been reported in countries where monkeypox was already endemic, none have been seen in the newly affected countries, Tedros said. However the WHO does not recommend mass vaccination against monkeypox, he said, after the European Union said today it had purchased almost 110,000 vaccine doses.