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The City of Windhoek Council has clashed with the management committee (MC) over the recruitment of a Chief Executive Officer.

Finance minister Iipumbu Shiimi has appointed a 19-member Technical Committee to spearhead consultations on the protracted Financial Institutions and Markets Act (FIMA).

Monkeypox patients around the world are suffering from symptoms not normally linked to the virus, leading to missed and mistaken diagnoses, researchers said.

Doctors are reporting some patients with only single sores from the disease, sometimes in the mouth, anus or genitals, according to a study released Thursday by the New England Journal of Medicine. The cases don’t conform to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s definition of monkeypox.

“Case recognition is vital, and we haven’t been equipped to actually recognize the disease,” said Chloe Orkin, a clinical professor of HIV medicine at Queen Mary University in London and lead author of the study, said in an interview.

Monkeypox has infected more than 15,000 people in the global outbreak, about 2,300 of them in the US. Historically, the virus has primarily spread through contact with infected animals or through household contacts in areas of West and Central Africa where it’s considered endemic. Now, however, it’s spreading mainly via close contact among men having sex with men.

Some local health departments have already alerted health workers to the new symptom patterns. A July 18 advisory from New York City health officials describes “atypical features” in some cases, including a shortened incubation period of 2 to 5 days, lack of fever or swollen lymph nodes, and the presence of only a few, scattered lesions most prominent in the anus and genital area.

Easily confused

“These different presentations highlight that monkeypox infections could be missed or easily confused with common sexually transmitted infections such as syphilis or herpes,” said John Thornhill, a sexual health and HIV doctor and professor at Queen Mary University who also contributed to the study, said in a statement. “We therefore suggest broadening the current case definitions.”

The study looked at 528 cases across 16 countries, the largest case report to date. Almost all of them were men who have sex with men, or who identify as gay and bisexual men. One reassuring finding, Orkin said, is that though monkeypox has been known to cause more serious symptoms in immunocompromised people, including those with HIV, their study did not see evidence of increased disease severity among monkeypox patients with HIV.

Though it spreads through intimate contact, monkeypox is not considered a sexually transmitted infection, and it still isn’t clear whether it spreads through sexual fluids, like semen. While the study found the virus in 29 of 32 semen samples tested, it hasn’t been shown that the fluids are infectious. Most blood samples tested didn’t test positive for the virus.

After early assurances that the US was prepared to handle a monkeypox outbreak, the country has hit snags in vaccine distribution and public-health messaging. The Health and Human Services Department has said that demand for Bavarian Nordic A/S’s Jynneos vaccine is oustripping supply and jurisdictions such as New York City have had problems getting shots in arms. Siga Technologies Inc.’s Tpoxx, an antiviral used to fight monkeypox, has also been extremely difficult for clinicians to prescribe.

The monkeypox response has brought back memories of the 1980s, when HIV treatment was difficult to access and patients were left waiting for life-saving medications, said Mordechai Levovitz, clinical director of the Jewish Queer Youth nonprofit. Advocacy groups including the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power are calling for more action on monkeypox by local lawmakers.-moneyweb

Mobile Telecommunications Limited (MTC) plans to nationalize its National Internship Program by raising N$14. 4 million per annum, which will be used to upscale the intake from the current 160 students to 1600 per year.

The City of Windhoek cumulative losses for the past 10 years now amount to N$3.2 billion after it recorded a N$480 million loss for the 2021 financial year, latest figures have revealed.

Epangelo Mining Company says the government should move swiftly and enact a policy that will allow it to get at least 10% of all mining exploration licences issued in the country.

The State-owned mining company's Chief Executive Officer, Eliphas Hawala, told The Brief that the policy, which was approved by Cabinet in 2011 but is yet to be enacted into law, will strengthen Epangelo's balance sheet and operations.

Hawala said the new policy was taking too long to be implemented due to various schools of thought on the issue.

 “Some people are saying exclusivity might be against sections of the country’s constitution, as everybody has rights to the minerals," he said.

Hawala, however, said exclusivity does not mean others are excluded from getting minerals.

“The constitution says the minerals belong to the state. Before you give them to someone you must leave something for the State. However, what is happening is that when one gets a prospecting licence, they get 100% rights to the minerals from the state and when the state says give us 10% in situations where money is exchanged, the state has to buy it back.”

Namibia currently has the same law that empowers the National Petroleum Corporation of Namibia (Namcor) to automatically receive a 10% equity in all oil and gas exploration activities taking place in the country.

When it comes to revenue generation by the mining company, Hawala said, “the difference between Namcor and Epangelo is that Namcor receives levies, and it has the money to make minimal contributions for explorations. On the other hand, we fund explorations through getting into joint ventures as well as with the money we get from the fiscus.”

Quizzed on the company’s mining portfolio, he said: “We want a diversified portfolio so that when uranium prices are down, gold prices might be at the top.”

He said the company was gearing up to start conducting its own explorations for uranium, amid an expected rise in global demand.

“We have licences for uranium. We have some in Erongo.We are applying for an environmental clearance [certificate] for all our EPLs,” the Epangelo CEO told The Brief.

Spot prices for uranium have more than doubled from lows of US$28 per pound last year to US$64 in April, sparking a fresh interest in restarting projects set aside after a 2011 earthquake and tsunami, which crippled Japan’s Fukushima nuclear power plant.

Uranium prices began to rise in mid-2021, as several countries seeking to limit climate change decided to move back to nuclear power as a source of carbon-free energy.

John Ciampaglia, CEO of Sprott Asset Management, which runs the Sprott Physical Uranium Trust, forecasts uranium could hit US$100 per pound in the long run, with prices having once peaked at around US$140 per pound in 2007, according to Reuters.

Namibia currently has only two mines producing the nuclear fuel - Rössing Uranium Mine and Husab Uranium.

Epangelo is a government-owned entity, whose main activities are exploration, mining, beneficiation, mineral processing, trading of minerals and financing of businesses.

 

The Government has been urged to create an enabling environment, policies and programs that will attract more youth to venture into agriculture.

The Namibian Stock Exchange (NSX) closed one of its best weeks, after it recorded trade valued at over N$2.8 billion last week.

The Namibia Financial Institutions Supervisory Authority (NAMFISA) says it will continue to roll out its five-year strategy despite a delay in the implementation of the Financial Institutions and Markets Act (FIMA).

The WHO has decided to issue monkeypox its highest level of alert: a Public Health Emergency of International Concern. But what's the deal with PHEICs — who decides, what does it mean, and what happens next?

The World Health Organization (WHO) on Saturday declared the ongoing worldwide monkeypox outbreak a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC), Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghrebeyesus announced.

Tedros made the declaration despite a lack of consensus among members of the WHO's emergency committee on the monkeypox outbreak. It's the first time a leader of a UN health agency has made such a decision. 

How has the outbreak spread?

The current outbreak started in May, with 20 cases recorded in Britain on May 20, mostly among gay men.

Since then, the outbreak has grown to almost 16,000 cases in 75 countries, Tedros said. Data from the CDC in the US indicate that in one day alone, from July 19 to July 20, confirmed case numbers leaped from 14,511 to 15,378. The current outbreak is centered in Europe.

Since July 14, Bermuda, Thailand, Serbia, Georgia, India and Saudi Arabia have all reported their first cases, adding to the now 73 countries where the current outbreak has been detected.

As the outbreak continues to grow, epidemiologists are split as to whether the WHO's decision was correct. The meeting was the second time the emergency committee convened, after a meeting on June 23 when it decided the outbreak had not met that threshold.

"It is a tricky decision for the committee," said Dr. Jimmy Whitworth, a professor of international public health at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine.

"In some senses, it meets the definition — it is an unprecedented outbreak widespread in many countries and would benefit from increased international coordination.

"On the other hand, it seems to be an infection for which we have the necessary tools for control; most cases are mild and the mortality rate is extremely low," Whitworth told DW.

What is a PHEIC?

The designation of a Public Health Emergency of International Concern is the WHO's highest alert level. It is based on international health regulations established in 2005, to define countries' rights and obligations in handling cross-border public health occurrences.

The WHO defines a PHEIC as "an extraordinary event which is determined to constitute a public health risk to other States through the international spread of disease and to potentially require a coordinated international response."

The WHO further explains how this definition implies a situation that is serious, sudden, unusual or unexpected; carries implications for public health beyond an affected country's border and may require immediate international action.

Who decides about a PHEIC?

The WHO's emergency committee on monkeypox provided WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus with advice on the disease but couldn't come to a consensus.

The WHO's emergency committee on monkeypox is composed of 16 members and chaired by Jean-Marie Okwo-Bele from the Democratic Republic of Congo, a former director of vaccines and immunization at the agency.

Other committee members include epidemiologists and disease experts from all around the world.

What are advantages and criticisms of PHEICs?

The purpose of a PHEIC is to focus attention on acute health risks that have the potential to spread internationally and threaten people around the world.

They are intended to help in mobilizing and coordinating information and resources, both nationally and internationally, for the purposes of prevention and response.

In practice, declaring PHEICs may end up causing a financial burden to the country facing the epidemic, particularly if travel and trade are curtailed. Indeed, some countries are reluctant to share public health data in the case of an outbreak for fear of such measures.

Critics of the PHEIC system note that an emergency is only declared when an event has started to spread internationally, indicating it has already reached an acute level. Some have called for various, intermediate stages of alarm.-DW

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