Pakistan, Sweden report deadly mpox strain virus cases

Pakistan has detected three patients with the mpox virus, the health department in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province said.

The department on Friday said that the viral infection was detected in the patients upon their arrival from the United Arab Emirates.

Pakistan's health ministry has said on Friday that it did not detect any new variant of pox in the country, Reuters news agency reported.

The World Health Organization has declared a recent outbreak of the disease as a public health emergency of international concern after a new variant of the virus has been identified.

Sweden also announced the first case outside Africa of the more dangerous variant of mpox, which the WHO has declared a global public health emergency.

The country's public health agency confirmed on Thursday that it was the same strain of the virus that has surged in the Democratic Republic of Congo since September 2023, known as the Clade 1b subclade.

"A person who sought care" in Stockholm "has been diagnosed with mpox caused by the clade I variant. It is the first case caused by clade I to be diagnosed outside the African continent," the agency said in a statement.

The person was infected during a visit to "the part of Africa where there is a major outbreak of mpox clade I", state epidemiologist Magnus Gisslen said in the statement.