China to Provide Emergency Medical Supplies to Lebanon

 Smoke billows over Beirut southern suburbs after a strike, amid the ongoing hostilities between Hezbollah and Israeli forces, as seen from Sin El Fil, Lebanon October 7, 2024. (Reuters)
Smoke billows over Beirut southern suburbs after a strike, amid the ongoing hostilities between Hezbollah and Israeli forces, as seen from Sin El Fil, Lebanon October 7, 2024. (Reuters)
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China to Provide Emergency Medical Supplies to Lebanon

 Smoke billows over Beirut southern suburbs after a strike, amid the ongoing hostilities between Hezbollah and Israeli forces, as seen from Sin El Fil, Lebanon October 7, 2024. (Reuters)
Smoke billows over Beirut southern suburbs after a strike, amid the ongoing hostilities between Hezbollah and Israeli forces, as seen from Sin El Fil, Lebanon October 7, 2024. (Reuters)

China will provide emergency medical supplies to Lebanon, China's official foreign aid agency, the China International Development Cooperation Agency, said on Tuesday, as Israel-Hezbollah fighting intensified.

Li Ming, spokesperson for the agency, said in a statement that as the fighting escalated recently, explosions and air strikes "have occurred in many places in Lebanon, causing a large number of casualties."

"At the request of the Lebanese government, the Chinese government has decided to provide emergency humanitarian medical supplies to Lebanon to help Lebanon carry out medical assistance," the statement said.

Hezbollah fired rockets at Israel's third-largest city, Haifa, and Israel looked poised to expand its offensive into Lebanon on Monday, one year after the devastating Hamas attack on Israel that sparked the Gaza war.

The focus of the war has increasingly shifted north to Lebanon where Israeli forces have been exchanging fire with Hezbollah since the Iranian-backed group launched a barrage of missiles in support of Hamas on Oct. 8.



Siga Technologies to Supply Mpox Therapy in Morocco

The Mohammed VI Tower in Rabat. (AFP)
The Mohammed VI Tower in Rabat. (AFP)
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Siga Technologies to Supply Mpox Therapy in Morocco

The Mohammed VI Tower in Rabat. (AFP)
The Mohammed VI Tower in Rabat. (AFP)

Drugmaker Siga Technologies said on Tuesday it would supply its therapy for mpox in Morocco as part of a contract in response to a request from the country's health ministry for protection against any potential outbreak of the disease.

Although the antiviral therapy Tpoxx has been available in Africa through clinical trials and the World Health Organization's emergency use access protocol to deal with the current outbreak of mpox virus, this agreement marks Siga's first commercial sale of the therapy on the continent, Reuters reported.

The therapy is approved in the US and Canada for the treatment of smallpox and authorized in Europe and the UK for smallpox, mpox, cowpox and complications from vaccinia virus.

The Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention stated last month that the outbreak is not under control, after the WHO declared it a public health emergency of international concern in August upon identifying the new variant.

Two cases of the disease have been confirmed in Morocco this year, according to the WHO.