WHO estimates unsafe food causes 866 million illnesses a year

Unsafe food causes an estimated 866 million illnesses and about 1.5 million deaths worldwide each year, according to reporting on updated World Health Organization estimates. Food Safety Magazine reported the more precise WHO figure as approximately 866 million illnesses and 1.52 million deaths in 2021 across 42 hazards.

The WHO estimates were produced by the Foodborne Disease Burden Epidemiology Reference Group for 2021–2025, according to Food Safety Magazine. The new estimates update the first edition published in 2015 and expand the covered hazards from 31 to 42, including microbiological hazards, parasites and chemicals.

Food Safety Magazine reported that WHO now compares the burden of foodborne disease with tuberculosis, HIV and AIDS, or malaria. The estimates use disability-adjusted life years to compare different hazards and help governments decide where to target food-safety interventions and resources.

The burden is not evenly distributed. The Week reported that children under five make up 9% of the global population but account for nearly one-third of all foodborne disease cases. Its article also noted that India records around 100 million foodborne illness cases each year, a figure projected to rise sharply by 2030.

Nigeria’s data shows how the global burden lands inside national health systems. AllAfrica, citing Premium Times, reported that Nigeria’s Minister of State for Health and Social Welfare, Iziaq Salako, said unsafe food causes nearly 50 million illnesses and more than 53,000 deaths annually in Nigeria.

Salako said foodborne diseases cause about 4.26 million years of healthy life lost annually in Nigeria through illness, disability and premature death, according to AllAfrica. He said most of the burden falls heavily on children under five, who account for more than 80% of all foodborne disease burden in the country.

Nigeria’s Federal Ministry of Information reported that Salako linked food safety to health, productivity and national development. It said Nigeria’s 2025 State Party Annual Report score places the country ahead of the WHO food-safety target for low- and middle-income countries and Sub-Saharan Africa, and that the country has strengthened systems for detecting, reporting and responding to foodborne disease events.

The Week’s reporting connects the global estimates to a Shigella threat in Kerala, including antibiotic resistance among several Shigella strains. That local example shows how food contamination can become harder to control when common treatments weaken, though the supplied evidence does not provide a full case count for the Kerala outbreak.

Foodborne disease is a daily infrastructure problem as much as a medical one. It moves through food production, storage, transport, markets, kitchens, water quality, inspection systems, laboratories and public communication. When those systems fail, the result is not only stomach illness but lost work, missed school, clinic strain and long-term harm to children’s development.

The updated WHO estimates show a vast but often quiet burden: hundreds of millions sickened each year, more than a million deaths, and the heaviest effects falling on young children and poorer health systems. The supplied evidence says the burden has trended downward since 2000, but the remaining scale still puts food safety among the world’s major public-health tasks.