Sweden reports first case of more severe mpox strain

Swedish officials said the clade I case of mpox detected in a patient "does not affect the risk to the general population".

Transcript

00:00Sweden has reported a case of a more severe strain of Mpox, the first clade 1 variant

00:07to be detected outside of an ongoing outbreak in African countries.

00:13Public health officials said it was diagnosed in a person who sought treatment in Stockholm

00:17after being infected in an area of Africa where the strain of the virus is spreading.

00:23It is of course something we take seriously.

00:26At the same time, this is a work that health and health care and the regional infectious diseases

00:31can and have developed routines and systems to handle.

00:37The Public Health Authority coordinates the work at a national level and has close dialogue

00:42with the regional infectious diseases.

00:45The announcement from Sweden comes a day after the World Health Organization said the outbreak

00:50of Mpox in Africa constituted a global health emergency.

00:54It's the second time Mpox has been designated a public health emergency of international concern in two years.

01:02WHO is on the ground working with the affected countries and others at risk through our country

01:09and regional offices as well as with partners including the Africa CDC, NGOs, civil society and more.

01:18The Swedish public health agency said that the patient being treated in the country for the virus

01:23doesn't pose a risk to the general population.

01:26But the WHO is warning that the new Mpox variant is a threat to the rest of the world.

01:32This one is spreading very rapidly and it's spread to countries in Africa that have never seen it before

01:38such as Rwanda, Kenya, Burundi. We're seeing a lot of cases in Burundi and also in Uganda.

01:45And these are countries that have got a lot of contact with the rest of the world.

01:49So that's a threat to the rest of the world.

01:53There are two subtypes of the Mpox virus.

01:56Clade 1 which is endemic in Central Africa is thought to cause more severe illness and higher mortality.

02:02The 2022 global outbreak was caused by Clade 2 which is endemic in West Africa.

02:08Around 300 cases of Mpox had previously been detected in Sweden linked to the 2022 global outbreak of the virus.