“This virus has been circulating & killing in Africa for decades. It’s an unfortunate reflection of the [world] we live in that the international community is only now paying attention to monkeypox because it has appeared in high-income countries” - WHO Chief @DrTedros
The World Health Organization said today more than 1,000 confirmed cases of monkeypox have been reported in 29 non-endemic countries.
It added that no deaths had been reported in these countries.
The record figures are likely to have increased even further since Russia's invasion of Ukraine which has left about 7.7 million people internally displaced, according to United Nations estimates released earlier this month.
The number of people internally displaced around the world reached 59.1 million at the end of 2021, a new record.
The figures are based on new research published by the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre and the Norwegian Refugee Council.
“Of the 2021 total, 1,924 people were reported dead or missing on the Central and Western Mediterranean routes, while an additional 1,153 perished or went missing on the Northwest African maritime route to the Canary Islands,” the UNHCR said.
3,077 people either died or went missing while travelling through the Mediterranean and Atlantic to reach Europe in 2021, the UN's Refugee Agency has said.
It is about double the figures reported in 2020, prompting the agency to call for greater levels of support.
Image: UNHCR