travel. In response to the declaration, the president of the DRC, together with an expert committee led by a virologist, took responsibility for directly supervising action, while in protest of the declaration, health minister, Oly Ilunga Kalenga resigned. A review of the PHEIC had been planned at a fifth meeting of the EC on 10 October 2019 and on 18 October 2019 it remained a PHEIC until 26 June 2020 when it was decided that the situation no longer constituted a PHEIC, as the outbreak was considered over. COVID-19 (2020–present) On 30 January 2020, the WHO declared the outbreak of COVID-19, centered on Wuhan in central China, a PHEIC. On the date of the declaration, there were 7,818 cases confirmed globally, affecting 19 countries in five of the six WHO regions. Previously, the WHO had held EC meetings on 22 and 23 January 2020 regarding the outbreak, but it was determined at that time that it was too early to declare a PHEIC, given the lack of necessary data and the then-scale of global impact. The WHO recognized the spread of COVID-19 as a pandemic on 11 March 2020. The third meeting of the emergency committee convened on 30 April 2020, fourth on 31 July, fifth on 29 October, sixth on 14 January 2021, seventh on 15 April 2021, ninth in October 2021, tenth in January 2022, eleventh in April 2022, twelfth in July 2022, thirteenth in October 2022, and fourteenth in January 2023. In September 2022, the Lancet commission on COVID-19 published a report, calling the response to the pandemic "a massive global failure on multiple levels". The WHO responded by noting "several key omissions and misinterpretations in the report, not least regarding the public health emergency of international concern (PHEIC) and the speed and scope of WHO's actions." They stated that the report "offers the best opportunity to insist that the failures and lessons from the past 3 years are not wasted but are constructively used to build more resilient health systems and stronger political systems that support the health and wellbeing of people and planet during the 21st century." Monkeypox (2022–present) At the second IHR meeting for the 2022 monkeypox outbreak on 21 July 2022, members of the emergency committee were divided about issuing a PHEIC, with six in favor and nine against. On 23 July 2022, the WHO director-general declared the outbreak a PHEIC. On the