Hacker Newsnew | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submitlogin

> So what’s the “emergency” in that context?

You've named it: "tens of thousands of cases outside of Africa". It entered the white world (disclaimer: I'm white myself).

On top of that we've just lived through (hopefully) the worst if the COVID pandemic, so WHO is additionally spooked.



My critique is that this could create a “boy who cried wolf” scenario.

And apparently this decision was actually an overrule by the director - a panel actually voted against it.


I agree with this risk. What wave of Covid are we ever-vigilant against currently?


This isn’t the first time monkeypox has been seen in the ‘white world’ though

> Monkeypox is a disease of global public health importance as it not only affects countries in west and central Africa, but the rest of the world. In 2003, the first monkeypox outbreak outside of Africa was in the United States of America and was linked to contact with infected pet prairie dogs. These pets had been housed with Gambian pouched rats and dormice that had been imported into the country from Ghana. This outbreak led to over 70 cases of monkeypox in the U.S. Monkeypox has also been reported in travelers from Nigeria to Israel in September 2018, to the United Kingdom in September 2018, December 2019, May 2021 and May 2022, to Singapore in May 2019, and to the United States of America in July and November 2021. In May 2022, multiple cases of monkeypox were identified in several non-endemic countries.

[0] https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/monkeypox


So now it's more of a "we're more scared now because of the pandemic we've just had".

This is as good a reason as any.


Because this is affecting the western world, it gets a huge attention. I'll keep dreaming of a world where headlines are about the 1.5 million confirmed deaths caused by diarrhea globally. Instead of a disease with 0 deaths in Europe out of 10k+ cases. But of course no one wants lesions because they don't look pretty on the gram.


>> I'll keep dreaming of a world where headlines are about the 1.5 million confirmed deaths caused by diarrhea globally

But that's not news. That's well known. Also, generalising 'news' makes no sense. Of course news sources from certain countries will focus on news that effects their readers. Deaths from diarrhea are of little relevance to the readers of any 'western' news source.


> You've named it: "tens of thousands of cases outside of Africa". It entered the white world (disclaimer: I'm white myself).

You’re probably being downvoted for this though it’s completely true.


"It's affecting us now and we're talking more about it, that's just racist!" I don't know why everything these days has to call to arms over how woke we all are.




Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: