Bacteria kills 800,000 children a year: studiesDeadly bacteria causing pneumonia, meningitis and blood infections kill more than 800,000 children a year, with Africa most at risk, experts said Tuesday. The pneumococcal pneumococcal /pneu·mo·coc·cal/ (-kok´al) pertaining to or caused by pneumococci. bacteria, which causes most invasive disease across the globe, is spread through person-to-person contact, and diseases such as meningitis ravage poor African communities. "Over 800,000 children die of pneumococcal diseases every year. When children in Africa get pneumococcal meningitis pneumococcal meningitis Neurology Meningitis caused by S pneumoniae, the most common meningitis pathogen in adults, and 2nd most common in children > age 6, which typically has an abrupt onset Risk factors Recurrent meningitis, meningitis with , it disables many of them. Fifty percent of them who survive it have disabilities," Orin Levine, an expert from Johns Hopkins School of Public Health in the United States told AFP (1) (AppleTalk Filing Protocol) The file sharing protocol used in an AppleTalk network. In order for non-Apple networks to access data in an AppleShare server, their protocols must translate into the AFP language. See file sharing protocol. . Two new studies by medical experts in the field highlight the urgency of preventing the spread of pneumococcal diseases in Africa. When pneumococcal bacteria attack the lungs, the result is pneumonia, which is the biggest killer of children under the age of five, resulting in more deaths than AIDS, measles and malaria combined, Jean-Marie Okwo-Bele of the World Health Organisation said at the release of the reports. About 1.6 million people across the globe die annually of pneumococcal disease, half of them children under the age of five, according to the studies released Tuesday. If the bacteria invade the brain, pneumococcal meningitis is caused, which leaves one in four children with serious disabilities, including cerebral palsy cerebral palsy (sərē`brəl pôl`zē), disability caused by brain damage before or during birth or in the first years, resulting in a loss of voluntary muscular control and coordination. , epilepsy, brain damage, kidney disease, deafness, limb amputations and developmental delay, the experts said. The preventable disease imposes an economic burden on African families, said Levine, a head of the Pneumococcal Awareness Council of Experts (PACE), a project of the Sabin Vaccine Institute, a US non-profit organisation. "In a typical rural village in Africa, when a child is disabled, it brings a lot of economic cost to the family. Consequently, the disease has a big impact on Africa," Levine said. There are over 90 types of pneumococcal diseases, which are most often treated with penicillin. The most common also include bacteremia bacteremia: see septicemia. bacteremia Presence of bacteria in the blood. Short-term bacteremia follows dental or surgical procedures, especially if local infection or very high-risk surgery releases bacteria from isolated sites. , when the bacteria attack the bloodstream, as well as sinusitis sinusitis Inflammation of the sinuses. Acute sinusitis, usually due to infections such as the common cold, causes localized pain and tenderness, nasal obstruction and discharge, and malaise. and middle ear infection middle ear infection Otitis media ENT A condition characterized by inflammation, fluid overproduction–which may rupture the tympanic membrane, providing a portal of entry for bacteria and viruses, purulence, bleeding; MEI is more common in children as their 
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