ISTANBUL

Japan on Wednesday confirmed the nation’s first death from mpox.

Healthy Ministry officials said the deceased was a man in his 30s, according to Tokyo-based Kyodo news agency.

He was living in the Saitama province near the capital Tokyo.

Japan had confirmed its first case of the mpox last year in July.

Last year, the World Health Organization renamed monkeypox to mpox, saying the name of the disease had acted as "racist and stigmatizing language."

In May this year, it declared that mpox was no longer a public health emergency of international concern.