Of the thirty bacteria selected, five alone account for more than half of the deaths, according to a study published in the Lancet.
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LBacterial infections are the second leading cause of death worldwide, after heart disease, shows a very large study published on Tuesday, citing staphylococcus aureus and pneumococcus among the most deadly bacteria. This study, published in the Lancet, selected around thirty bacteria – the most commonly involved in infections – and assessed how many deaths were associated with them.
These measurements are made within the framework of the Global Burden of Disease. This vast research program, funded by the Bill Gates Foundation, is of an unparalleled scale, involving several thousand researchers in most countries of the world. In the end, “deaths associated with these bacteria constitute the second leading cause of death worldwide” after coronary heart disease, which notably includes heart attacks, conclude the authors. With 7.7 million deaths linked to a bacterial infection, one in eight deaths can be attributed to them, even if these figures date back to 2019, before the Covid pandemic.
An “urgent priority” in public health
Of the thirty or so bacteria selected, five alone account for more than half of the deaths: staphylococcus aureus, E. coli, pneumococcus, Klebsellia pneumoniae and bacillus pyocyanin. Staphylococcus aureus is “the leading bacterial cause of death in 135 countries,” the study said. However, among the youngest (under five years old), pneumococcal infections prove to be the most deadly. For the researchers, these results illustrate how bacterial infections are an “urgent priority” in public health. They call for work on the prevention of infections, better use of antibiotics (in particular to avoid phenomena of resistance), and more effective use of vaccination.
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