A global accounting of sepsis

For the past two decades, attention to sepsis has intensified because of growing recognition that it is one of the most common and lethal conditions we face, whether as a patient, provider, hospital, or public health agency. Until now, we have had an incomplete accounting of the global epidemiology of sepsis, with several reports from high-income countries and relatively few from countries of low and middle income (LMICs). In The Lancet, Kristina Rudd and colleagues1 present an analysis of data from the Global Burden of Diseases, Injuries, and Risk Factors Study (GBD) 2017, which is the most comprehensive assessment of the worldwide sepsis burden to date.