India has found its first cases of a superbug that can lead to blindness, flesh-eating infections and meningitis, according to researchers.

Klebsiella pneumoniae was found in patients by doctors at the Christian Medical College (CMC), in the city of Vellore, over a two-year period, after they were admitted for sepsis.

Researchers found that 27 (31 per cent) of 86 patients treated for sepsis in the hospital had become infected by a strain of Klebsiella pneumoniae, that was found to be both resistant to antibiotics and hypervirulent.

The study, published in the Journal of the Association of Physicians of India also claimed that the first Indian case was in a Delhi hospital six years ago, but that it was not officially recorded, suggesting there could be more instances around the country.

“Our findings establish its presence in India — we’re hoping our results will make other hospitals do similar investigations,” said Dr Balaji Veeraraghavan, professor of clinical microbiology at CMC.

“We have published the findings at great risk as it brings a bad name to the hospital and will potentially lead to panic among people. But we thought it was important to highlight the damage that the anti-microbial resistance is causing to public health,” he told reporters.