Campylobacter: An overview of cases, occurrence in food, contamination sources, and antimicrobial resistance in Brazil

Abstract

ABSTRACTCampylobacter has been the most prevalent microorganism associated with foodborne gastroenteritis in developed countries in the last years. The consumption of contaminated chicken meat is the main source of campylobacteriosis in humans. However, in developing countries, Campylobacter has not been recognized as a food safety problem. Here, we provide an overview of studies focusing on occurrence of Campylobacter in Brazilian chicken processing chain, epidemiological data, contamination sources, antimicrobial resistance and fields where more studies are needed. Over the past 15 years, only five foodborne outbreaks involving 37 cases of campylobacteriosis were reported in Brazil. However, the occurrence of Campylobacter in samples of carcasses and chicken products was about 32.7%, and the microbial load ranged from <0.30 to 5.15 log10 CFU. This pathogen was also found in feces, caecum, intestine and cloaca of chicken (50.9%), chicken litter (65.4%), and water (13.7%). The most prevalent species identified in the studies were C. jejuni (80%) and C. coli (19.6%). In addition, high antimicrobial resistance rates were noted for cephalosporins (98.5–100%), quinolones (84.5%), and fluoroquinolones (77.6–82.8%). This review demonstrates that Campylobacter seems to be an important pathogen in the chicken processing chain and, consequently, for public health in Brazil.