Content of the article
GENEVA – The World Health Organization said Monday it would start using a new preferred term, “mpox,” as a synonym for monkeypox and urged others to follow suit after receiving complaints that the current name of the disease was racist and stigmatizing.
“Both names will be used simultaneously for one year while monkeypox is phased out,” the WHO said in a statement.
Content of the article
The WHO launched a public consultation process to find a new name for the disease earlier this year and received more than 200 proposals. The United States, which was among the countries and organizations supporting the name change, welcomed the announcement.
Content of the article
The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) will also begin using the term “mpox,” CDC Director Rochelle Walensky said in a tweet.
“We welcome and support the name change to mpox to reduce stigma and barriers to serving those most affected,” Walensky added.
US Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra said that “reducing the stigma associated with the disease is a critical step in our work to end smallpox.”
One of the most popular public suggestions was “mpox” or “Mpox”, proposed by the men’s health organization RÉZO, among others. Its director said at the time that removing the images of the monkeys helped people take the health emergency seriously.
Some ideas were farcical such as “Poxy McPoxface” alluding to Boaty McBoatface – the choice of a public vote on the name of a British polar research vessel, before the decision to give it another name: Sir David Attenborough.
Content of the article
The WHO said global experts settled on “pox” after considering scientific appropriateness, scope of current use and pronounceability among other factors.
Mpox, discovered in 1958 and named after the first animal to show symptoms, spread mostly in a group of countries in West and Central Africa until this year.
About 100 countries where smallpox is not endemic have now reported outbreaks of the viral disease.
WHO is mandated to assign new names to existing diseases according to the International Classification of Diseases.
It generally aims to avoid associating any disease or virus with a country, region, animal or ethnic group.
Last year, it assigned the letters of the Greek alphabet to new coronavirus variants to stop the practice of linking them to specific countries.
(Reporting by Emma Farge in Geneva, Shivani Tanna and Baranjot Kaur in Bengaluru; Additional reporting by Ahmed Aboulenien and Jeff Mason in Washington; Editing by Mark Heinrich and Simon Cameron-Moore)