RONIA PARVIN, SAILA SHARMIN SUHI, MOST. NOURIN AKTHER SHORNA, MD. ABU SHIFAT SHITOL, HASINAY ZANNAT AND FARZANA ASHRAFI NEELA
Abstract
Salad vegetables are essential in our daily diet because they provide affordable nutrients. However, they can serve as vectors for the transfer of antibiotic resistance to consumers. In this study, we demonstrated an inter-farm measurement that provides a unique assessment to better understand the proximate causes of drug resistance in human food chains. Salad vegetable samples (cucumber, carrot and tomato) were collected from three agricultural farms in Kharkhari, Rajshahi, Bangladesh. Isolation of tetracycline-resistant bacteria was carried out by the agar dilution method using nutrient agar supplemented with 32 µg/ml tetracycline at 37 ºC for 24 hours. Antimicrobial susceptibility testing was performed by the Kirby-Bauer disc diffusion method on Mueller Hinton agar using commercial antibiotic discs. Resistant isolates were identified by 16S rRNA sequencing. A total of 34 tetracycline-resistant bacteria were isolated randomly from three types of salad vegetables to determine their susceptibility to ampicillin, kanamycin and ciprofloxacin. The result shows three resistance patterns among vegetable isolates in a very close geographical area, suggesting various patterns of drug resistance in environmental bacteria. The bacteria identified are: Enterobacter cloacae, Bacillus cereus, Chryseobacterium spp., Pseudomonas sp., and Enterobacter sp. The presence of antibiotic-resistant bacteria in agricultural products of plant origin may offer valuable information on the transmission of resistant bacteria from farms to consumers via the food chain, raising serious concerns for human health