Early Action on Sepsis Diagnostics: A Proven Path to Save Lives and Millions
Sponsored Content By bioMérieux
Jessica Blavignac, Director of Scientific and Medical Affairs, bioMérieux
Somewhere in Canada today, a patient will arrive at a hospital with a serious infection that has spread to the bloodstream. Doctors will be faced with a critical decision to determine which antibiotics will save this patient’s life. They will base their decision on the information they have on hand, which might not paint the full picture of what the patient is facing. In the worst-case scenario, the patient deteriorates into sepsis.
This isn’t an episode of a medical drama.
This is a reality playing out across Canada—and around the world—as sepsis continues to rise as one of the leading causes of preventable deaths. But we have the tools to change those outcomes.
A groundbreaking health economic analysis published this month by the Office of Health Economics (OHE), one of the world’s leading independent health economics research organizations, and bioMérieux reveals that deploying fast diagnostic testing early in the care pathway for bloodstream infections could prevent 2,400 Canadians from progressing to sepsis annually, with projected healthcare system savings of $42 million every year. Beyond the dollars, this research demonstrates something equally important: that timely diagnostic information empowers clinicians to make the right treatment decisions at the moment that matters most.
The Sepsis Crisis We’re Not Fully Addressing
Consider the scale of the challenge. Forty-two thousand patients are hospitalized with bloodstream infections each year in Canada alone. Sepsis, a life-threatening reaction to infection, is our country’s top preventable cause of death, accounting for one in every 18 Canadian deaths.1 Globally, it kills 21 million people annually.2
Yet, despite signing onto the World Health Organization’s sepsis resolution in 2017, Canada has been slow to implement its proposed national sepsis plan in a consistent way, largely due to differences in political and healthcare funding strategies, leaving Canadian patients vulnerable to uneven adoption and inconsistent standards across provinces and hospital networks.3
Timing is Everything in the World of Sepsis
The first few hours following a bloodstream infection diagnosis are the difference between life, permanent impairment and death.4 Targeted antibiotic treatment is the key determinant of survival, yet conventional diagnostic methods take two to three days to deliver results – far too long when dealing with sepsis.5
Forced to make treatment decisions with incomplete information, nearly one-in-five bloodstream infection patients receive inappropriate initial antibiotics.6 The result is preventable deterioration, longer hospital stays, higher mortality and cascading costs throughout the health system.
Fast identification and antimicrobial susceptibility testing (ID/AST) technologies can substantially shorten time-to-results compared to current standard of care, changing the game for clinicians to pivot to targeted treatment.
The Evidence is Clear and Comprehensive
This new analysis, conducted across all seven G7 nations using realworld hospital data and local epidemiology, is the first to rigorously quantify what early access to fast diagnostics could achieve across a 13-month time frame. The findings are remarkably consistent across diverse healthcare systems.
- 20 per cent reduction in sepsis cases across all countries.
- Fewer sepsis-related deaths and dramatically reduced long-term complications.
- Consistent cost savings regardless of how health systems are structured or financed.
For Canada specifically, the numbers are compelling. $1,000 in savings per patient, totalling $42 million in annual savings.7 Critically, 53 per cent to 83 per cent of these savings occur during the initial hospitalization, precisely when preventing deterioration into sepsis care’s most resource-intensive stages deliver the greatest value.8
Why Policymakers Should Act Now
The case for policy reform is straightforward but urgent. Diagnostics have long been treated as line items in healthcare budgets rather than value-generating tools that prevent costlier interventions downstream.
This analysis ends the cost-benefit arguments against action. The evidence shows that faster diagnostics used in the patient pathway deliver remarkable value for both patients and our health system, far exceeding their upfront costs.
The Path Forward
Policymakers have a clear opportunity. Provincial health authorities and hospital networks should update reimbursement structures to value diagnostics based on their system-wide impact, not just their direct costs. They should strengthen diagnostic capacity to ensure equitable access across provinces. They should align incentives so that savings realized throughout the health system incentivize early testing. And they should embed fast diagnostics early in clinical pathways for bloodstream infections.
These changes would mean fewer preventable deaths, shorter hospital stays and reduced post-sepsis complications that can haunt survivors and their caregivers for years.
The economic impact is proven and backed by science. Thousands of Canadian lives and tens of millions in healthcare savings are on the table. We must urge policymakers to act now.
Jessica Blavignac is the Director of Scientific and Medical Affairs, bioMérieux Canada.
1 - Canadian Sepsis Foundation. https://www.canadiansepsisfoundation.ca/about-sepsis. Accessed March 2026.
2 - Gray A, Chung E, Hsu R et al. Global, regional, and national sepsis incidence and mortality, 1990–2021: a systematic analysis. The Lancet Global Health, 2025
3 - Fatima Sheikh, Victoria Chechulina, Gary Garber, Kathryn Hendrick, Niranjan Kissoon, Laurie Proulx, Kristine Russell, Alison E Fox-Robichaud, Lisa Schwartz, and Kali A Barrett, “Reducing the burden of preventable deaths from sepsis in Canada: A need for a national sepsis action plan,” Healthcare Management Forum, vol. 37, no. 5, pp. 366–370, April 10, 2024, https://doi. org/10.1177/08404704241240956.
4 - Seymour CW, Gesten F, Prescott HC, et al. Time to treatment and mortality during mandated emergency care for sepsis. N Engl J Med. 2017;376(23):2235-2244. doi:10.1056/NEJMoa1703058, https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa1703058.
5 - Prescott HC, Antonelli M, Alhazzani W, et al. Surviving Sepsis Campaign: International Guidelines for Management of Sepsis and Septic Shock 2026. Crit Care Med. 2026;54(4):725-812. doi:10.1097/CCM.0000000000007075, https://journals.lww.com/ccmjournal/fulltext/2026/04000/ surviving_sepsis_campaign__international.5.aspx.
6 - Kadri, S.S., Lai, Y.L., Warner, S., Strich, J.R., Babiker, A., Ricotta, E.E., Demirkale, C.Y., Dekker, J.P., Palmore, T.N., Rhee, C., Klompas, M., Hooper, D.C., Powers, J.H., Srinivasan, A., Danner, R.L. and Adjemian, J., 2021a. Inappropriate Empiric Antibiotic Therapy in Bloodstream Infections at U.S. Hospitals based on Discordant In vitro Susceptibilities: A Retrospective Cohort Analysis of Prevalence, Predictors and Mortality Risk. The Lancet. Infectious diseases, 21(2), pp.241–251. DOI: 10.1016/S1473-3099(20)30477-1.
7 - Kadri, S.S., Lai, Y.L., Warner, S., Strich, J.R., Babiker, A., Ricotta, E.E., Demirkale, C.Y., Dekker, J.P., Palmore, T.N., Rhee, C., Klompas, M., Hooper, D.C., Powers, J.H., Srinivasan, A., Danner, R.L. and Adjemian, J., 2021a. Inappropriate Empiric Antibiotic Therapy in Bloodstream Infections at U.S. Hospitals based on Discordant In vitro Susceptibilities: A Retrospective Cohort Analysis of Prevalence, Predictors and Mortality Risk. The Lancet. Infectious diseases, 21(2), pp.241–251. DOI: 10.1016/S1473-3099(20)30477-1.
8 - Hassan S., Hamlyn T., Fong H., Hampson G. 2026. The Value of Fast Diagnostics in Time-Critical Infections. OHE Contract Research Report, London: Office of Health Economics.
© 2026 Hill Times Publishing