20.01.2016

Foodborne diseases are an important cause of morbidity and mortality, and a significant impediment to socioeconomic development worldwide, but the full extent and burden of unsafe food, and especially the burden arising from chemical and parasitic contaminants, has been unknown. Precise information on the burden of foodborne diseases can adequately inform policy-makers and to allocate appropriate resources for food safety control and intervention efforts. A report, resulting from the WHO Initiative to Estimate the Global Burden of Foodborne Diseases and prepared by the WHO Foodborne Disease Burden Epidemiology Reference Group (FERG), provides the first estimates of global foodborne disease incidence, mortality, and disease burden in terms of Disability Adjusted Life Years (DALYs). For the global estimates, thirty-one foodborne hazards causing 32 diseases are included. Together, the 31 hazards caused 600 million foodborne illnesses and 420,000 deaths in 2010.
The most frequent causes of foodborne illness were diarrhoeal disease agents, particularly norovirus and Campylobacter spp. Foodborne diarrhoeal disease agents caused 230,000 deaths, particularly non-typhoidal Salmonella enterica (NTS) which causes diarrhoeal and invasive disease.