The majority of bacterial meningitis cases in the past three years occurred in adults despite the illness often being associated with young children, Times of Malta has learnt.
Data on the number of bacterial meningitis cases since 2016, supplied to Times of Malta by the Health Ministry, show that of the 34 cases reported to the authorities, 21 involved patients over the age of 18. There were 11 patients who were younger than five years of age when they contracted the illness and another two aged between six and 17.
Read: What you can do to prevent meningitis
Three patients died of the illness in the three years under review – a four-year-old boy earlier this month, a 13-month-old baby in 2017 and a 19-year-old in 2016.
Information on the less-serious viral meningitis was not supplied by the ministry.
Times of Malta sought the information following reports of children being rushed to hospital with the illness in recent weeks, including the boy who died of a form of the illness the authorities said was “very rare”.
Some days later, a new-born baby was admitted to Mater Dei Hospital after developing signs of the illness.
Bacterial meningitis is the most dangerous
According to the health authorities, meningitis could be caused by many different types of bacteria and the kind contracted by the baby only affected infants in the first three months of their life.
Doctors who spoke to Times of Malta last week echoed the health authorities’ reactions, insisting the two cases were in no way connected adding the public’s fear of an outbreak was the result of the two cases being reported around the same time.
Read: Meningitis – everything you need to know
According to paediatric cardiologist Victor Grech, the common types of meningitis are viral and bacterial.
Viral meningitis usually leads to fever, a headache, discomfort or pain to the eyes due to light exposure and neck stiffness. No treatment is usually necessary except supportive: treating the pain and drinking lots of fluids.
On the other hand, bacterial meningitis is the most dangerous as it could be fatal or leave permanent consequences such as deafness. Such forms are mainly haemophilus influenza B (HIB), which is covered by the five-in-one vaccine given to infants at the age of two, three and four months; pneumococcus, which also causes respiratory disease such as pneumonia, and meningitis and meningococcus.
Health Minister Chris Fearne said in Parliament on Wednesday the Health Department will later this year start providing the pneumoccal conjugated meningitis vaccine to children free of charge.