Global, regional, and national burdens: An overlapping meta-analysis on Staphylococcus aureus and its drug-resistant strains.

Objective: To provide an inclusive blend of extant meta-analyses on the burden of Staphylococcus (S.) aureus and its resistant strains across diverse study populations, settings, and temporal contexts. Methods: The study has adopted PRISMA 2020-based guides and registered its protocol on Open Science Framework with an extensive literature search. Study quality was assessed by QUOROM and AMSTAR techniques. Data analysis included parsing of study-level statistical power, assessment of primary study overlap, pooling of meta-analysis results, subgroup and temporal analysis. Results: Totally 41 studies (64 meta-analyses) were selected by the inclusion criteria. The summary meta-analysis revealed global prevalence rates for S. aureus [24.8%, 95%C1 0.248(0.204-0.293), I2 = 93%], methicillin resistant S. aureus (MRSA) [5.8%, 95% CI 0.058(0.044-0.073), I2 = 92%], vancomycin intermediate S. aureus [1.7%, 95%C1 0.017(0.013–0.021), I2 = 36.4%], heterogeneous vancomycin intermediate S. aureus [5.2%, 95% CI 0.052(0.038–0.056), I2 = 36.4%], community-associated methicillin-resistant S. aureus [19.9%, 95%C1 0.199(-0.170–0.568), I2 = 96.67%), livestock-associated-MRSA [13.6%, 95% CI 0.136(-0.028–0.243), I2 = 97.7%], and mupirocin resistant S. aureus [7.6%, 95% CI 0.076(0.062–0.090), 12 = 0%]. Temporal analysis revealed that the burden community-associated methicillin-resistant S. aureus notably increased from 1.3% in 2003 to 39.0% in 2014. Coagulase-negative staphylococci rose from 23.2% in 2021 to 29.8% in 2022. Vancomycin resistant S. aureus peaked at 9.0% in 2018, declining to 2.6% in 2020. Livestock-associated-MRSA significantly increased to 19.0% in 2020. MRSA fluctuated, peaking at 52.7% in 2012 and 31.0% in 2022. Conclusions: The study reveals a considerable global prevalence of S. aureus at 24.8%. Regional differences were apparent, with Africa facing a high burden of MRSA at 40.8% of S. aureus and temporal trends exposed a dynamic state. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]