MULTI-DRUG RESISTANCE AND PUBLIC HEALTH SIGNIFICANCE OF ENTEROCOCCUS FAECIUM ISOLATED FROM APPARENTLY HEALTHY AND CLINICALLY DIARRHEIC RUMINANTS IN EGYPT

Document Type : Research article

Authors

1 Department of microbiology, Animal Health Research Institute (Assiut lab), Agricultural Research Center (ARC), Egypt.

2 Department of Microbiology, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Cairo University

3 Animal Health Research Institute, Agricultural Research Center (ARC)

4 Department of Zoonosis, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Cairo University

Abstract

Enterococci are Gram-positive cocci found in various animate sources as well as various living animals and human. The current study was designed to identify Enterococcus spp. from farm ruminants and define their antimicrobial resistance and virulence components to assess their potential public health concern. One hundred and sixty four fecal samples were collected from 28 apparently healthy ruminants as well as 136 diarrheic ones. The collected samples were laboratory-investigated via Enterococcus spp. standardized isolation and identification protocol. All presumptively identified isolates were further cultured on Vancomycin-resistant enterococci (VRE) chromogenic agar media, then the obtained isolates were further biochemically tested for virulence assessment. The antimicrobial resistance profile was elucidated by the disc diffusion method. The Enterococcus species discrimination was achieved via polymerase chain reaction. The results detected VRE from 61 diarrhea samples; (44.85%), without any VRE isolate obtained from the apparently healthy samples. Twenty five out of the 61 obtained isolates were catalase negative. Only, 22 catalase-negative isolates were bile esculin positive. Finally, 18 from the bile esculin positive were 6.5% NaCl-tryptic soy broth positive and beta-hemolytic on horse blood agar media. Those 18 isolates were examined for vancomycin resistance resulting in 7 sensitive, 4 intermediate, and 7 resistant isolates. The vancomycin-resistant-confirmed isolates were further identified to species level as E. faecium. It has concluded that the obtained E. faecium isolates harbored antibiotic resistance and virulence components which explain their capacity to be potential human pathogens and public health concern.

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