Despite being largely preventable, meningitis still results in a significant number of global fatalities each year. The World Health Organization (WHO) has established ambitious targets to decrease the prevalence of meningitis cases by 2030. Evaluating the patterns in the worldwide burden of meningitis can facilitate the monitoring of progress and identification of gaps in achieving these objectives.

Utilizing data from the Global Burden of Diseases, Injuries, and Risk Factors Study (GBD) 2019, the research aimed to evaluate new cases and fatalities linked to acute infectious meningitis based on the cause and age from 1990 to 2019, covering 204 countries and territories.

To estimate meningitis-related mortality, the authors employed vital registration, verbal autopsy, sample-based vital registration, and mortality surveillance data. Meningitis morbidity was analyzed using a Bayesian compartmental model, incorporating data from systematic reviews of published literature, surveillance data, inpatient hospital admissions, health insurance claims, and cause-specific meningitis mortality assessments.

To ascertain the causes of meningitis, the study analyzed data from various sources including multiple causes of death, vital registration records, hospital discharge summaries, microbial laboratory findings, and literature studies. A network analysis model was employed to estimate the proportion of meningitis deaths and cases attributed to specific causes such as Neisseria meningitidis, Streptococcus pneumoniae, Haemophilus influenzae, group B Streptococcus, Escherichia coli, Klebsiella pneumoniae, Listeria monocytogenes, Staphylococcus aureus, viruses, and other miscellaneous pathogens.1

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References

  1. Wunrow, H. Y., Bender, R. G., Vongpradith, A., Sirota, S. B., Swetschinski, L. R., Novotney, A., Gray, A. P., Ikuta, K. S., Sharara, F., Wool, E., Aali, A., Abd‐Elsalam, S., Abdollahi, A., Aziz, J. M. A., Abidi, H., Aboagye, R. G., Abolhassani, H., Abu‐Gharbieh, E., Adamu, L. H., . . . Kyu, H. H. (2023). Global, regional, and national burden of meningitis and its aetiologies, 1990–2019: a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2019. Lancet Neurology, 22(8), 685–711. https://doi.org/10.1016/s1474-4422(23)00195-3

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