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GENEVA: Faced with a surge in monkeypox cases, the head of the World Health Organization is Saturday expected to declare if the agency has decided to classify the outbreak as a global health emergency — the highest alarm it can sound. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus will address a virtual press conference at 1300 GMT, the WHO announced in a statement late Friday. It did not reveal what would be announced. Monkeypox has affected over 15,800 people in 72 countries, according to a tally by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) published on July 20. A surge in monkeypox infections has been reported since early May outside the West and Central African countries where the disease has long been endemic. On June 23, the WHO convened an emergency committee (EC) of experts to decide if monkeypox constitutes a so-called Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC) — the UN health agency’s highest alert level. But a majority advised the Tedros that the situation, at that point, had not met the threshold. The second meeting was called on Thursday with case numbers rising further, where Tedros said he was worried. “I need your advice in assessing the immediate and mid-term public health implications,” Tedros told the meeting, which lasted more than six hours. A US health expert sounded a grim warning late Friday. “Since the last #monkeypox EC just weeks ago we’ve seen an exponential rise in cases. It’s inevitable that cases will dramatically rise in the coming weeks & months. That’s why @DrTedros must sound the global alarm,” Lawrence Gostin, the director of the WHO Collaborating Center on National and Global Health Law, said on Twitter. “A failure to act will have grave consequences for global health.” A viral infection resembling smallpox and first detected in humans in 1970, monkeypox is less dangerous and contagious than smallpox, which was eradicated in 1980. Ninety-five percent of cases have been transmitted through sexual activity, according to a study of 528 people in 16 countries published in the New England Journal of Medicine — the largest research to date. Overall, 98 percent of infected people were gay or bisexual men, and around a third were known to have visited sex-on-site venues such as sex parties or saunas within the previous month. “This transmission pattern represents both an opportunity to implement targeted public health interventions, and a challenge because in some countries, the communities affected face life-threatening discrimination,” Tedros said, citing concern that stigma and scapegoating could make the outbreak harder to track. “I am acutely aware that any decision I take regarding the possible determination of a Public Health Emergency of International Concern involves the consideration of many factors, with the ultimate goal of protecting public health,” he added. The European Union’s drug watchdog on Friday recommended for approval the use of Imnavex, a smallpox vaccine, to treat monkeypox. Imvanex, developed by Danish drugmaker Bavarian Nordic, has been approved in the EU since 2013 for the prevention of smallpox. It was also considered a potential vaccine for monkeypox because of the similarity between the monkeypox virus and the smallpox virus. The first symptoms of monkeypox are fever, headaches, muscle pain and back pain during the course of five days. Rashes subsequently appear on the face, the palms of hands and soles of feet, followed by lesions, spots and finally scabs.
MANILA: The Philippines has detected its first case of monkeypox in a person with a history of overseas travel, officials said Friday. The announcement comes within a week of the World Health Organization declaring the monkeypox outbreak a global health emergency. Philippine officials did not identify the gender of the person, only saying they were 31 years old and tested positive on Thursday after an RT-PCR test. “The case had prior travel to countries with documented monkeypox cases,” said Beverly Ho, an acting undersecretary for the Department of Health. “Ten close contacts were recorded, of which three are from the same household. All have been advised to quarantine and are being monitored by the department.” A surge in monkeypox infections has been reported since May outside the West and Central African countries where the disease has long been endemic. WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said Wednesday that more than 18,000 cases have now been reported to the organization from 78 countries, with 70 percent of them in Europe and 25 percent in the Americas. Five deaths have been reported in the outbreak since May, he said. The Philippines sought to head off potential panic, saying monkeypox was not like Covid-19. “This is not like Covid that can be spread by air very easily and could possibly be fatal,” said Trixie Cruz-Angeles, press secretary for President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. “This is not particularly fatal.” Ho said the Philippines was working with the United States to secure monkeypox vaccines.
MEXICO CITY: Authorities in Mexico said Thursday that at least 94 migrants had to bash their way out of a suffocating freight trailer abandoned on a highway in the steamy Gulf coast state of Veracruz. Carlos Enrique Escalante, the head of the state migrant attention office, said migrants had to break holes in the freight container to get out, some apparently through the roof. Some were injured when they leapt from the roof of the trailer, but their injuries did not include any broken bones and were not considered life-threatening. Escalante said local residents near the town of Acayucan heard the noise, and helped open the freight container. A much larger number of migrants were believed to have been aboard and fled after escaping. But the 94 migrants from Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador were turned over to immigration authorities. The discovery of the trailer Wednesday recalled the tragedy in San Antonio, Texas on June 27, when 53 migrants died because they had been left in a sweltering freight truck. In the southern Mexico state of Chiapas, which borders Guatemala, yet another group of migrants continued demanding temporary visas they would permit them to travel across Mexico. They were still in the town of Huixtla on Thursday after leaving Tapachula earlier this week, saying they can’t wait months for slow immigration paperwork in Tapachula.
WASHINGTON: The District of Columbia has requested National Guard assistance to help stem a “growing humanitarian crisis” prompted by thousands of migrants that have been sent to Washington by a pair of southern states. Mayor Muriel Bowser formally asked the White House last week for an open-ended deployment of 150 National Guard members per day as well as “suitable federal location” for a mass housing and processing center, mentioning the D.C. Armory as a logical candidate. She met on July 21 with Liz Sherwood-Randall, assistant to the president for homeland security, and Julie Chavez Rodriguez, director of the White House Office of Intergovernmental Affairs. The crisis began in spring when Texas Gov. Greg Abbott and Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey announced plans to send busloads of migrants to Washington, D.C., in response to President Joe Biden’s decision to lift a pandemic-era emergency health order that restricted migrant entry numbers. Since then the city estimates that nearly 200 buses have arrived, delivering more than 4,000 migrants to Union Station, often with no resources and no clue what to do next. A coalition of local charitable groups has been working to feed and shelter the migrants, aided by a $1 million grant from the Federal Emergency Management Agency. But organizers have been warning that both their resources and personnel were nearing exhaustion. “This reliance on NGOs is not working and is unsustainable — they are overwhelmed and underfunded,” Bowser said in her letter. She has repeatedly stated that the influx was stressing her government’s ability to care for its own homeless residents and required intervention from Biden’s government. “We know we have a federal issue that demands a federal response,” Bowser said at a July 18 press conference. In her letter, Bowser harshly criticizes Abbott and Ducey, accusing them of “cruel political gamesmanship” and saying the pair had “decided to use desperate people to score political points.” Bowser does not have the authority to personally order a National Guard deployment, an issue that has become emotionally charged in recent years as a symbol of the district’s entrenched status as less than a state. Her limited authority played a role in the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the Capitol building by supporters of former President Donald Trump. When it became clear that the US Capitol Police were overmatched by the crowds, Bowser couldn’t immediately deploy the district guard. Instead, crucial time was lost while the request was considered inside the Pentagon, and protesters rampaged through the building.
PARIS: Jack Lang is one of the prominent cultural public personalities in France. He was minister of culture from 1981 until 1986, and again from 1988 until 1993. He was also minister of national education from 1992 to 1993, and from 2000 to 2002.
Lang has been deeply connected with Arab culture by virtue of his presidency of the Institut du Monde Arabe (IMA), or the Arab World Institute, in Paris since 2013. Under his leadership, the Arab World Institute, founded in Paris in 1980, has organized cultural workshops, concerts, conferences, exhibitions, festivals and activities both in France and around the Arab world.
The IMA has a museum, library and auditorium, and seeks to provide a secular location for the promotion of Arab civilization, art, knowledge and aesthetics as well as the teaching of Arabic. It was founded in 1980 by 18 Arab countries and France to research information about the Arab world, including its cultural and spiritual values.
Q. What is your perception of Franco-Saudi cooperation?
A. First of all, I welcome the visit of Saudi Arabia’s crown prince to Paris. This is an important event, which will certainly open up new possibilities in bilateral relations and will consolidate the political, economic, strategic and cultural ties between France and Saudi Arabia.
I am not directly linked to political life, so I do not have to comment on related issues. I know that there are differences that may arise; these are discussions that will undoubtedly take place between the leaders of the two countries, President Emmanuel Macron and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
For my part, I cannot forget that historically, the two founding countries of the IMA were Saudi Arabia, at the time of King Khalid, and France, with President Valery Giscard d’Estaing.
Q. What about Franco-Saudi cooperation in the context of cultural projects?
A. Saudi Arabia is a fabulous country that is developing many ambitious projects like the AlUla project, initiated by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Prince Badr bin Abdullah bin Farhan Al-Saud, the Saudi minister of culture, and supported by France via the French agency in charge of the development plan for this site.
Personally, I belong to the advisory committee, operating under the authority of Prince Badr. The committee does exceptional work for the preservation of the site, its history and the beauty of these incredible places. Every time I go to AlUla, I am struck by the progress of archaeological, touristic, economic and social projects.
I am also impressed by the respect that AlUla officials have for the history of the sites and the local populations, who are fully associated with the project, which is indicative of the ambition the Kingdom sets for its cultural revolution.
In France, in Europe, and more generally in the West, we do not know enough about the extent to which Saudi Arabia is starting a real cultural revolution. If we compare the situation five years ago with that of today, we see a radical change brought about by the impetus of the crown prince in all areas of culture: Cinema, theater, museums, architecture and music.
There is a rather unique cultural breath and momentum in this country. I can cite the first Red Sea International Film Festival, organized in Jeddah last year, or the many exceptional projects scheduled in Riyadh, a city destined to become one of the greatest cultural capitals of the world.
It is the same for the other cities and regions of the country, which are experiencing this dynamic in all artistic and creative disciplines. What is being accomplished today in Saudi Arabia is astonishing and remarkable.
If the visit of the crown prince is an opportunity to make this happy and positive metamorphosis better known, it is wonderful. I can only rejoice in this extraordinary cultural effervescence which makes Saudi Arabia a major country in world culture.
Q. What is the place of youth in this “cultural revolution?”
A. This cultural, educational and scientific strategy mobilizes the youth, who represent the Saudi Arabia of tomorrow. Many young people re
cognize themselves through this new impetus. If we go today to Jeddah, Riyadh or elsewhere in the country, we see that a new cultural event takes place every week. It is kind of a permanent cultural revolution.
Personally, I am one of those people who thinks that each country must prioritize culture, youth, science and education. This is the choice made by the Saudi authorities to build the future of the country.
France, as a country committed for a long time to these issues, will find itself in full harmony with Saudi achievements.
Q. What about cooperation between Saudi Arabia and the IMA?
A. Since I have chaired the IMA, I have forged close relationships with the cultural leaders of the Kingdom. The crown prince has decided to provide financial support for the renovation of the mashrabiyas on the walls of the IMA building, designed by (French architect) Jean Nouvel.
We are discussing many projects, including the possible creation of an IMA in Riyadh and, above all, the possible support of Saudi Arabia for the renovation of the IMA museum, which is destined to become one of the most important museums of contemporary Arab art in the West.