Helicobacter pylori Infection in Developing Countries: The Burden for How Long?

Approximately 50% (over 3 billion) of the world populations are known to be infected with Helicobacter pylori, mainly in the developing countries. Among those, hundreds of millions of people develop peptic ulceration during their lifetime and still tens of millions might progress to gastric cancer. Possible modes of H. pylori transmission generally described are through direct contact between family members and also through contaminated water and food. Because the high prevalence of infection occurs mainly in developing countries and because the test-and-treat strategy puts a huge economic burden on many of these countries, it is time to take an immediate action toward this bacterial infection and adopt a strategy to prevent it. To address this issue, an updated prevalence of infection, modes of transmission, economics of infection and preventative measures to block the infection process have been discussed.