The U.N. health agency, which declared a public health emergency of international concern two weeks ago, said that the plan will last six months—September 2024 to February 2025—and will receive $135 million in funding.

"Strategic vaccination" efforts will target people at the highest risk such as "close contacts of recent cases and healthcare workers, to interrupt transmission chains," the agency said.

The WHO plan will focus on "implementing comprehensive surveillance, prevention, readiness, and response strategies; advancing research and equitable access to medical countermeasures like diagnostic tests and vaccines; minimizing animal-to-human transmission; and empowering communities to actively participate in outbreak prevention and control," according to a statement.

Officials say that a subvariant of the virus has caused global concern because it seems to spread more easily through routine close contact.

WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in the Aug. 26 statement that the mpox outbreak, which originated in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, "can be controlled and can be stopped."

"Doing so requires a comprehensive and coordinated plan of action between international agencies and national and local partners, civil society, researchers and manufacturers, and our Member States," he said.

More Cases Confirmed Outside Africa

The Philippines has confirmed two more mpox virus infections of the milder Clade II variety, its health ministry said on Aug. 26, bringing the number of active cases to three.

"We continue to see local transmission of mpox Clade II here in the Philippines, in Metro Manila in particular," Secretary of Health Teodoro Herbosa said in a statement.