STUDIES ON THE ROLE OFSTRAY DOGS AS CARRIERS FOR SOME BACTERIAL AND MYCOTIC PATHOGENES TO MAN AT BEHERA GOVERNORATE

One hunderd and fifteen faecal samples were collected from stray dogs at various localities of Behera Governorate, particularly from Edfina, El-Mahmodia and Damanhour localities, as well as especially from those gaining access to human garbage. These samples were examined bacteriolo gically and mycologically for isolation some members of Enterobacteriaceae and pathogenic fungi of public health hazard. The most predominant bacterial isolates were E.coli (55.7%), Proteus spp. (15.6%), Enterobacter spp. (11.3%), Citrobacter freundi (6.9%) and Klebsiella pneumoniae (2.6%). The 14 pathogenic strains of E.coli recognized (21.9%) were differentiated serologically into the following 0-serogroups: 02, 04, 06, 015, 011, 026 and 0101. At thesame time three important human pathogens: Shigella flexineri type 6, Sal. typhimurium and Sal. enteritidis were recovered
in an incidence of 0.9, 1.7 and 0.9% respectively. The results of mycolo gical investigation revealed that the incidence of the isolates were Mould spp. (19.1%), Yeast spp. (1.7%) and Yeast-like organisms (5.2%). The zoonotic importance of these isolates was discussed.