18.K. Workshop: Burden of foodborne disease: methods and relevance of national studies
Authors:   Organised by: COST Action CA18218,   Chair persons: Sara Pires - Denmark, Brecht Devleesschauwer - Belgium
Published: October 2020

Despite increased political attention, foodborne diseases (FBD) still cause a substantial public health, economic and social burden worldwide. Recognizing the need to measure the burden of FBD and encourage evidence-informed policies, in 2015 the World Health Organization reported the first estimates of global and regional disease burden due to 31 foodborne hazards. Results showed that each year 1 in 10 people get ill from food contaminated with pathogens or chemicals, resulting in 600 million cases, 420,000 deaths and the loss of 33 million healthy years globally. While these estimates were crucial to raise awareness, they were the product of an enormous research initiative that faced substantial data gaps. Importantly, they did not offer the precision needed to identify priorities at national level, and were not able to make use of all data resources available. Precise national disease burden estimates are essential to identify the most important diseases and hazards in a country, the foods contributing most to these diseases, and the interventions need to effectively prevent disease. In recent years, various countries have recognized the need for studies of the national burden of FBD, and have taken steps to implement them. Despite progress, these are still a minority, and mostly representing high income countries in few regions of the world; many other countries still lack awareness, resources, and data to estimate burden and rank FBDs. Furthermore, the current burden of disease landscape remains scattered, and researchers struggle to translate their findings to decision makers. The recently established European Burden of Disease Network (burden-eu, COST Action 18218) will address these challenges by acting as a technical platform for integrating and strengthening capacity in burden of disease assessment across Europe and beyond. Burden-eu currently gathers members from 37 European countries and observers from non-European countries and international organizations, and has a working group focusing on foodborne diseases. This workshop consists of four presentations. In the first, an example of a well-established national burden of disease study is presented, and the utility of its results for policy making and establishing public health priorities are discussed. Next, main challenges to estimating burden of FBD in developing countries, and the experience and opportunities deriving from a large-scale research in this setting are presented. The fourth presentation will focus on the role of international organizations, in particularly the WHO, in supporting countries to develop capacity, implement and maintain country-level burden of disease studies. The workshop will end with ample time for discussions on current approaches and opportunities for methodological developments, challenges, possible solutions and potential for collaborations to increase implementation and utility of studies of FBD burden globally.

Key messages

National burden of foodborne disease studies are essential to establish food safety as a public health priority, identify the most important food safety problems, and inform prevention strategies. Different initiatives are emerging to support international collaboration across countries and public health authorities worldwide.