The World Health Organisation (WHO) has published its first-ever global guidelines for the diagnosis, treatment and care of meningitis, which remains a significant global health threat.
Bacterial meningitis is the most dangerous form and can become fatal within 24 hours. Many pathogens can cause meningitis, with an estimated 2.5m cases reported globally in 2019, and which includes 1.6m cases of bacterial meningitis, which resulted in around 240 000 deaths.
“Bacterial meningitis kills one in six of the people it strikes, and leaves many others with lasting health challenges," said Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General.
“Implementing these new guidelines will help save lives, improve long-term care for those affected, and strengthen health systems.”
The highest burden of the disease is seen in a region of sub-Saharan Africa, often referred to as the “meningitis belt”, which is at high risk of recurrent epidemics of meningococcal meningitis.
The new guidelines provide evidence-based recommendations for the clinical management of children over four-weeks-old, adolescents, and adults with acute community-acquired meningitis. They provide recommendations for both non-epidemic and epidemic settings, the latter superseding previous 2014 WHO guidelines, which covered meningitis outbreak response.
Because resource-limited settings bear the highest burden of meningitis, these guidelines have been specifically developed to provide technical guidance suitable for implementation in low- and middle-income countries.
They are intended for use by healthcare professionals in first- and second-level facilities, including emergency, inpatient, and outpatient services.
Policymakers, health planners, academic institutions, and civil society organisations can also use them to inform capacity-building, education, and research efforts.
The guidelines contribute to the broader Defeating Meningitis by 2030 Global Roadmap, adopted by WHO Member States in 2020, which aims to: eliminate bacterial meningitis epidemics, reduce cases of vaccine-preventable bacterial meningitis by 50% and deaths by 70%, and reduce disability and improve quality of life after meningitis.
WHO guidelines meningitis
WHO launches guidelines (Open access)
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