Thankfully, the World Health Organization says there’s no evidence of a global outbreak nor outside of Congo.

The World Health Organization is “very worried” about the spread of a severe form of mpox that has killed nearly 600 people, mainly children, in the Democratic Republic of Congo this year, a senior official said.

The country has reported over 13,000 cases in 2023, more than twice as many as during the last peak in 2020, with the disease occurring in almost every province. The WHO is working with the authorities on the response and a risk assessment.

On Thursday, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) issued an alert about the dangerous clade I mpox outbreak.

“The virus variant is known to be more virulent. If it adapts better to human to human transmission, that presents a risk,” Rosamund Lewis, WHO’s mpox lead, told Reuters by phone from Kinshasa.

Reuters says W.H.O. is unsure as to what extent sexual activity is contributing to the spread of clade 1 since the previous variant also spread via consuming contaminated food, other human contact methods (like skin-on-skin) including household and body fluids. The global agency also told Reuters that symptoms can include unexplained skin rashes or lesions around someone’s body, including genitals, and can include fever-link symptoms.

The new variant’s ability to spread faster and the higher fatality rate that averages of up to 10% of cases is concerning. This disease not only affects gay men, but also sex workers of both genders since Congo has a thriving sex trade.

In addition to the new Chinese virus that ended up in the U.S. a short time ago, the appearance of this new mpox strain is suspicious too. Fortunately, a vaccine is available to prevent mpox from spreading and is likely why the sickness did not spread much in the U.S.. In any event, since monkeypox was renamed by the W.H.O. last year, a more fitting name for the illness was given by Tucker Carlson last year.

PHOTO CREDIT: Close-up of monkeypox lesions on the arm and leg of a four year old female child. By not listed – http://phil.cdc.gov (CDC’s Public Health Image Library) Media ID #2329, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=6314378