Understanding Mpox and How Outbreaks Spread: QuickTake

The global eradication of smallpox more than 40 years ago was one of the greatest achievements in public health history, vanquishing a cause of death, blindness and disfigurement that had plagued humanity for at least 3,000 years. However, its success led to the end of a global vaccination program that provided protection against related diseases. Those include mpox, which has spilled over from its animal hosts to infect humans in West and Central Africa with increasing frequency since the 1970s. Now a dangerous, mutated strain of the virus has been detected in at least six African countries, leading the World ...