Bacterial meningitis kills one in three children for life

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– When children are affected, the entire family is affected. If a three-year-old has cognitive impairment, motor impairment, weakness or loss of vision or hearing, this has a significant impact. It's about lifelong disabilities that become a huge burden on both the individual and society because those affected need support from the health care system for the rest of their lives, he says. Federico Yovinosenior researcher and lecturer at Department of NeuroscienceKarolinska Institutet and one of the authors of the current study.

By analyzing data from the Swedish Quality Registry for Bacterial Meningitis between 1987 and 2021, researchers were able to compare nearly 3,500 people who had bacterial meningitis as children with nearly 32,000 matched controls from the general population. On average, the follow-up period is more than 23 years.

The results showed that those diagnosed with bacterial meningitis always had a higher incidence of neurological impairments such as cognitive impairment, seizures, visual or auditory disturbances, motor impairment, behavioral disturbances, or structural damage to the head.

Greatest risk of head injuries

The risk was greatest for structural damage to the head – 26 times the risk, hearing impairment – almost eight times the risk and motor disability – almost five times the risk.

About one in three people with bacterial meningitis had at least one neurological impairment, compared with one in ten among the controls.

– This shows that even if the bacterial infection is treated, many people suffer from neurological disabilities afterwards, says Federico Iovino.

Having determined the long-term effects of bacterial meningitis, Federico Iovino and his fellow researchers will now move forward with their research.

– We are trying to develop treatments that can protect neurons in the brain during the time window of a few days for antibiotics to have their full effect. We now have very promising data from human neurons and are about to enter the pre-clinical phase with animal models. “We hope eventually we can offer this in the clinic,” Federico Ivino says.

The research was funded by Merck & Co (MSD in Sweden).

Publishing

“Increased risk of long-term disabilities after childhood bacterial meningitis in Sweden” Salini Mohanty, Orban Johansson Kosteniemi, Sven Arne Silvverdahl, Stina Salomonsson, Federico Iovino, Erik M. Sarpong, Goran Pencena, Gustav Broz. JAMA Network open, online January 19, 2024.