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The Biden administration plans to declare the monkeypox outbreak a public health emergency as soon as Thursday in an effort to raise awareness and unlock additional flexibility and funding to fight the spread of the virus.
The declaration will come from Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra, who is expected to discuss the plan at an afternoon briefing, said two officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to comment. The health secretary plans a second declaration authorizing federal officials to fast-track medical countermeasures, such as potential treatments and vaccines, without going through full federal reviews. It would also allow more flexibility in how current vaccine supplies are administered, officials said.
The administration’s announcement follows similar decisions by health officials in New York, California and Illinois and global health leaders. The World Health Organization on July 23 declared monkeypox a public health emergency of international concern, its highest level warning, following confirmed outbreaks in about 70 countries where the virus has not spread in the past.
Federal leaders have spent weeks debating whether to declare monkeypox a public health emergency, and officials said Thursday’s planned announcement was part of a broader push to contain the virus. The announcement follows the White House’s decision this week to appoint Robert J. Fenton Jr., a longtime employee of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, to coordinate the national response to the virus.
HHS and the White House did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
US officials are scrambling for strategies to increase access to monkeypox treatments and vaccines, with limited supply of Jynennos, the only vaccine approved by the Food and Drug Administration to protect against the virus. Federal officials have identified about 1.6 million people as most at risk from monkeypox, but the U.S. has only received enough doses of Jyennos to fully cover about 550,000 people.
More than 6,600 cases of monkeypox have been confirmed in the United States since May 18, with the vast majority among men who have sex with men — a total that doubles every 8 days, but which experts believe is significantly less. Officials also reported at least five cases of monkeypox in children believed to have been contracted through household transmission.
WHO staff last week advised men who have sex with men to temporarily reduce the number of sexual partners they have in an effort to reduce transmission.
What you need to know about monkeypox symptoms, treatment and protection
Although health officials have stressed that monkeypox poses far fewer risks than the coronavirus — with only a few deaths worldwide and none so far in the United States — the virus can cause fever, swollen lymph nodes, a rash and often painful lesions , which can last for weeks and lead to scarring. The virus is also linked to more severe complications in children, pregnant women and people with immune disorders.
The infectious disease, which comes from the same family of viruses as smallpox, is spread primarily through close contact, and experts say they believe skin-to-skin exposure during sexual activity is a major source of transmission in the current outbreak. But they warn that the virus spreads through other forms of touch and may circulate outside the gay community, noting a handful of cases in women and children.
Some Biden officials previously argued that declaring a monkeypox emergency would draw attention to the growing outbreak and boost the nation’s overall response. For example, the emergency declaration could be used to force hospitals to report more data about their monkeypox patients and allow the Food and Drug Administration to speed up medical responses that would otherwise take months or years to go through traditional regulatory reviews.
Federal officials on Thursday also released an “options memo” on how a public health emergency would improve the nation’s response to monkeypox, according to two officials who were not authorized to comment. POLITICO first reported the memo’s existence.
Many public health experts also confirmed the WHO’s decision to declare a public health emergency, saying a coordinated global response was “essential” to tackling the growing epidemic. House Oversight Chairwoman Carolyn B. Maloney (DN.Y.) last week urged HHS to declare a public health emergency, calling the move a “crucial next step” to combat the spread of the virus.
But Becerra’s decision to declare monkeypox an emergency could create political complications for the White House, which has faced calls from advocates to declare gun violence a public health emergency and climate change a national emergency. Democrats such as Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and reproductive health rights groups have also lobbied the administration to declare abortion access a public health emergency after a recent Supreme Court decision that overturned Roe v. Wade and led to new restrictions on abortion across the country.
The Biden administration also continued to renew public health emergency declarations that expire every 90 days for opioids and the coronavirus.
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