MASERU, Aug. 06 —- The World Health Organization (WHO) has released a new target product profile to guide the development of in vitro diagnostic tests for serious bacterial infections in newborns and young infants, including neonatal sepsis, which is a leading cause of infant deaths globally.
Each year, an estimated 2.3 million newborns die, with low- and middle-income countries bearing the greatest burden and roughly 15% of these deaths are due to sepsis. Evidence suggests that 84% of newborn deaths due to infection could be prevented through early diagnosis and appropriate clinical management.
WHO states that current diagnostic methods for serious bacterial infection, including bacterial sepsis, are often inadequate, inaccessible, or unaffordable in both hospital and non-hospital health facilities, while diagnostic methods, such as blood cultures and molecular diagnostics, face significant limitations, including low sensitivity and long turnaround times, high costs and infrastructure requirements, and inadequate performance.
“Timely and accurate diagnosis tests for serious bacterial infection is critical to reducing newborn mortality,” said Dr Yvan J-F. Hutin, Director of the Department of Antimicrobial Resistance at WHO.
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