The World Health Organization’s global health experts has reportedly agreed to rename Monkeypox to “MPOX“, POLITICO writes.

The World body writes in a statement “A group of global experts convened by WHO has agreed on new names for monkeypox virus variants, as part of ongoing efforts to align the names of the monkeypox disease, virus and variants – or clades – with current best practices. The experts agreed to name the clades using Roman numerals”.

The statement adds “The group reached consensus on new nomenclature for the virus clades that is in line with best practices. They agreed on how the virus clades should be recorded and classified on genome sequence repository sites.”

CNET writes “Global health officials have been working on finding a new name for monkeypox for months, with the WHO citing ‘instances of racist and stigmatizing language online and in other settings‘, as an outbreak of the disease expanded across the globe earlier this year. Monkeypox was originally named in 1958, before the WHO’s best practices for naming a disease were in effect. Two strains or “clades” of the disease were renamed over the summer, breaking their association with specific regions or countries.”