FRIDAY, July 17, 2026 (NewsDay News) — The prevalence of healthcare-associated infections in the United States was lower in 2023 than it was in 2015, according to a study published in the July 16 issue. New England Journal of Medicine.
Nora Chea, MD, of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, and colleagues identified hospital-acquired infections in a single survey day between May 1 and September 30, 2023, to examine changes in the prevalence of these infections since 2015.
The researchers found that in 2023, 355 of 13,653 patients from 218 hospitals had at least one healthcare-associated infection, compared with 394 of 12,299 patients at 199 hospitals in 2015 (2.6 versus 3.2 percent). Of the healthcare-associated infections, nearly 60 percent were not related to devices or procedures. After adjusting for other factors, patients were less likely to have a healthcare-associated infection in 2023 than in 2015 at the 151 hospitals included in both studies (hazard ratio, 0.73). In 2023, there will be approximately 518,000 healthcare-associated infections in US hospitals.
“This is good news for patient safety and quality of health care — we are grateful to our healthcare and healthcare partners who have helped make this progress possible,” said co-author Shelly S. Magill, MD, Ph.D., also of the CDC, in a statement. “We are committed to working with partners to prioritize patient safety and invest in innovative strategies to reduce healthcare-associated infections and protect the health of all Americans.”
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