As of 2008, mankind is confronted by 346 generic infectious diseases, distributed in a seemingly haphazard fashion across 220 countries. An average of three new diseases are described every two years - and a new infecting organism is published every week ! Over 1,600 human pathogens have been reported, each with a specific set of phenotypic, genomic and susceptibility characteristics which must be confronted by diagnostic laboratories and clinicians. The pathogens are in turn confronted by 276 generic anti-infective agents and 67 vaccines - marketed under 10,493 proprietary names.

Table 1, below, lists the major infectious diseases and pathogens which have been reported since 1972. Many conditions on this list (ie, Lyme disease, Legionellosis, Cyclosporiasis) are in fact old diseases which were only “discovered” when technology permitted us to recognize their presence. This is also true of many “new” pathogens, which could only be discovered because of the advent of molecular biology and other sophisticated laboratory techniques.
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