The World Health Organization (WHO) does not have evidence that the monkeypox virus has mutated, a senior executive at the UN agency said in a briefing on Monday morning, noting the infectious disease that has been endemic in West and Central Africa has tended not to change.

Dr. Rosamund Lewis, head of the smallpox secretariat, which is part of the WHO Emergencies Program, told the briefing that mutations tend to be typically lower with the monkeypox virus, although genome sequencing of cases will help inform understanding of the current outbreak.

Most of the more than 100 suspected and confirmed cases in a recent outbreak in