Typhoid fever and its cousin, paratyphoid A fever, are the main causes of bacterial blood infections in children in Africa; children in many parts of Sub-Saharan Africa also suffer from typhoid. Typhoid stands out as a neglected disease: Children living in densely populated, poor, urban areas with inadequate water and sanitation infrastructure suffer the highest rates of typhoid and paratyphoid fever. Typhoid fever is becoming an even more dangerous public health problem due to rapid and unregulated urbanization in developing countries, combined with the emergence of multidrug-resistant typhoid.

The impact of these diseases has gone largely unnoticed. There remains a lack of adequate research, funding, and political commitment to address these diseases. As a result, we lack critical information about the pathogens including viruses, bacteria, and parasites that cause these diseases and about the environmental factors that increase their occurrence.