United States President Joe Biden, who is currently in Tokyo, was asked about the recent monkeypox outbreak that is slowly turning global. Biden had earlier said that monkeypox was something everyone should be “concerned about.”

The monkeypox outbreak was again brought up the next day in Tokyo as Biden spoke to a pool of reporters. He clarified that he did not see the need to institute strict quarantine measures, Associated Press reported.

Also Read: Are there any treatments, preventive measures for monkeypox?

He even compared monkeypox, a disease that has been reported across continents over the last week, to COVID-19. Biden said in a statement, “I just do not think it rises to the level of the kind of concern that existed with COVID-19.”

He also addressed the United States’ readiness to tackle widespread infection of monkeypox. Biden said that health regulators had enough stockpile of vaccines. “I think we do have enough to deal with the likelihood of a problem,” he said, according to Associated Press.

Multiple health regulators across the globe have previously agreed to use smallpox vaccines for monkeypox infections, saying that the two diseases were similar.

The United States currently has one confirmed and active case of monkeypox. Apart from the one confirmed case in Massachusetts, there is one presumptive positive case in New York, one in Washington state, two in Utah and two in Florida, as per the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Also Read: Monkeypox outbreak: 5 things to know about the disease

While Biden does not seem to think strict quarantining is currently necessary, Belgium has taken a different approach. Authorities instructed everyone infected with monkeypox to isolate themselves for 21 days. This also applies to those who came in close contact with the infected individual.

Monkeypox is rarely identified outside of Africa. However, as of Monday, the World Health Organization had confirmed 92 cases of the disease in 12 countries, with a further 28 suspected cases under review.