Ghana has recorded its first confirmed case of Mpox in 2024, health authorities said on Thursday, as the virus continues to spread in Africa.
This is even as more than 800 people across Africa have died from the disease, the African Union’s disease control centre said Thursday, warning the epidemic “was not under control”.
Some 34,297 cases have been recorded across the continent since January, the AU’s Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC) said, adding that the figure included 38 cases in Ghana.
This brings to 16 the number of African countries where mpox has been officially detected this year, according to the health agency.
“The epidemic is not under control,” Jean Kaseya, the head of Africa CDC told a press briefing, saying the number of deaths since the start of the year was 866.
He also warned that the testing rate remained “too low”, noting that some 2,500 new cases had been detected in the past week.
However, the patient in Ghana, a young boy from the Western North Region -– about 475 kilometres (295.1 miles) from the capital Accra — showed symptoms of the virus including a rash, fever, and body pains, the director-general of Ghana Health Service (GHS) Patrick Kuma-Aboagye said in a statement.
While the child has since been discharged and is in a table condition, officials have identified and are monitoring 25 people who were in contact with him.
“The suspected case of Mpox was isolated in line with protocols for managing Mpox,” Kuma-Aboagye said.
About 230 other suspected cases are being investigated in the West African country, GHS sources told AFP on Thursday.
More than 860 people have died from some 34,297 cases recorded across Africa since January, Jean Kaseya, the head of Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC) said at a press briefing on Thursday afternoon, adding that “we have a new country that declared mpox this week… 38 (cases), that is Ghana.”
ALSO READ:Mpox: WHO Approves First Jab
The virus has two subtypes of the virus: clade 1 and clade 2.
The deadlier clade 1 has been endemic in the Congo Basin in central Africa for decades.
Although GHS did not divulge which clade of the virus was detected, the less severe clade 2 has become endemic in parts of West Africa.
The country saw a total of eight cases in 2023 and 120 in 2022.
Several African nations, including Nigeria, the Democratic Republic of Congo, South Africa, and Ivory Coast have also recorded multiple confirmed cases this year.
“We have activated our public health emergency systems as we investigate other cases,” Kuma-Aboagye told AFP by telephone on Thursday. “There is no cause for alarm.”
Africa CDC declared mpox a Public Health Emergency of Continental Security (PHECS) in August 2024, shortly after the World Health Organization (WHO) classified it as a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC).
Mpox, a viral disease related to smallpox, is transmitted to humans from animals but can also spread between people through close contact. Symptoms include fever, body aches, swollen lymph nodes, and a rash that forms into blisters.
A new strain, called clade 1b, was first detected among sex workers in the DRC in September 2023. AFP