The Ghana Health Service (GHS) has heightened its surveillance and emergency response systems to quickly detect possible cases of Mpox which has surged in the sub-region. This follows the declaration of the disease by the African Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC) as a "public health emergency" of security concern on Tuesday. In view of this, Myjoyonline.com explores ways you, our cherished reader, can stay safe: Origin The Monkeypox virus was first identified in the State Serum Institute in Copenhagen, Denmark, in 1958 during an investigation into a pox-like disease among monkeys. But it was first identified in humans in 1970 in Zaire (now known as the Democratic Republic of Congo) in a 9-year-old boy in a region where smallpox had been eliminated in 1968. In the spring of 2003, monkeypox cases were confirmed in the Midwest of the United States of America, marking the first reported occurrence of the disease outside of the African continent.