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Medications account for the highest number of allergic fatalities in the US every year, a new study shows.

Researchers at Montefiore Medical Center and Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University examined death certificates from 1999 to 2010 to find that medications caused 58 percent of all allergic fatalities. Fatal allergic reaction, also called anaphylaxis, caused 2,458 deaths in the US during this period, researchers noted.

"Anaphylaxis-related deaths in the U.S. have not been well understood in recent years. We hope these findings will help in identifying specific risk factors and allow physicians to formulate preventative approaches," Elina Jerschow director, Drug Allergy Center, Allergy and Immunology Division of Medicine, Montefiore Medical Center, and assistant professor of medicine, Albert Einstein College, the lead author of the study, said in a press release.

In nearly 74 percent of anaphylactic deaths caused by medications, the fatal drug was not identified but researchers found that antibiotics were responsible in half the cases where the allergen was specified. Radio contrast and chemotherapy drugs also figures on the list of death-causing drugs.

Researchers also found that drug fatalities through anaphylaxis increased from 0.27 per million during 1991-2001 to 0.51 per million in 2008-2010. Increased use of drugs for cancer treatment and improved diagnosis was blamed for the increase.

"Anaphylaxis has been dubbed 'the latest allergy epidemic. The U.S. and Australia have some of the highest rates of severe anaphylaxis among developed countries. We hope these results bring increased awareness of the need for a better understanding of anaphylaxis deaths," Dr. Jerschow said.

In addition to drug anaphylaxis, researchers found that venom and food also caused considerable number of deaths. Their analysis further revealed that increased risk of dying from drug and unspecified anaphylaxis was higher in African American people and the elderly. White older men were at higher risk of dying from venom anaphylaxis, the researchers wrote.