The Ghana Health Service (GHS) has announced that the country has recorded 5 monkeypox cases.

This was disclosed by the Director General of the GHS, Dr. Kuma Aboagye in Accra.

He said: “So far since the outbreak in Europe occurred, we tested 12 suspected cases in Ghana since 24 May. Currently, we have confirmed five cases in three regions – Eastern, Western and Greater Accra – this is where we discovered the five cases, no death has occurred among the cases here,” he said.

“One of the cases has been recorded in a Ghanaian who travelled to the US from Ghana, he might have picked it from here,” the GHS boss added.

Monkeypox is a rare but potentially serious viral illness that can be transmitted from person to person through direct contact with body fluid or monkeypox lesions.

The virus has now been detected in 16 countries outside Africa.

More than 100 cases of the virus – which causes a rash and a fever – have been confirmed in Europe, the Americas and Australia.

That number is expected to rise still, but experts say the overall risk to the broader population is very low.

The virus is most common in remote parts of Central and West Africa.

“This is a containable situation,” the WHO’s emerging disease lead Maria Van Kerkhove said at a news conference on Monday.

“We want to stop human-to-human transmission. We can do this in the non-endemic countries,” she added – referring to recent cases in Europe and North America.