Following the World Health Organization’s declaration of monkeypox as a global health emergency on Saturday, the federal government is ramping up its own efforts to respond to the outbreak and trying to keep up with the demand for vaccines.
The outbreak started in May and now there are over 16,000 cases worldwide and about 2,500 in the United States. The first two cases of monkeypox in children in the United States were recently confirmed and they were “adjacent to the community most at risk,” which is gay men, said Dr. Rochelle Walensky, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, during an interview with Washington Post Live on Friday. There have been no deaths in the United States from the current outbreak.
