Abstract
Data on the prevalence of MCR-producing Enterobacterales of animal origin are scarce from the Arabian Peninsula. We investigated the presence and variety of such strains from fecal specimens of poultry collected in four farms in the United Arab Emirates. Colonies from ten composite samples per farm grown on colistin-supplemented plates were PCR-screened for alleles of the mcr gene. Thirty-nine isolates selected based on species, colony morphology, and plasmid profile were subjected to whole genome sequencing. The panel of their resistance and virulence genes, MLST and cgMLST were established. Transferability and incompatibility types of the MCR-plasmids were determined. mcr-1.1 positive strains were identified in 36 of the 40 samples. Thirty-four multi-drug resistant Escherichia coli of 16 different sequence types, two Escherichia albertii, two Klebsiella pneumoniae and one Salmonella minnesota were identified. Beyond various aminoglycoside, tetracycline, and co-trimoxazole resistance genes, seven of them also carried ESBL genes and one blaCMY-2. Six IncHI2, 26 IncI2 and 4 IncX4 MCR-plasmids were mobilized, in case of the IncHI2 plasmids co-transferring ampicillin, chloramphenicol and tetracycline resistance. The diversity of mcr-1 positive strains suggest a complex local epidemiology calling for a coordinated surveillance including animals, retail meat and clinical cases.
Highlights
Colony morphology and unique plasmid profiles, a total of 39 strains were selected for further studies (Supplementary Table S1). These strains were subjected to whole genome sequencing (WGS), which confirmed the identification of 34 E. coli, two Escherichia albertii, two Klebsiella pneumoniae and 1
Multi-locus sequence typing (MLST) and core genome MLST analysis was performed for the two K. pneumoniae and the 34 E. coli isolates
Mcr-mediated colistin resistance among clinical isolates have been encountered in almost all countries of the region, these were usually sporadic multi-drug resistant (MDR), often carbapenem resistant strains [10,11,12,13,14,15,16,17,18] and the colistin resistance among the majority of them seemed to be chromosomally encoded [9,10]
Summary
The emergence of multi-drug resistant (MDR) Gram-negative bacteria necessitated their reintroduction into human medicine, which was followed by increasing rate of colistin resistance. This alarming phenomenon has been best studied among carbapenem resistant Gram-negative rods, i.e., the primary targets of polymyxin use [3,4]. This already distressing scenario was further aggravated by the description of mostly plasmid, and sometimes chromosomally located mobile colistin resistance genes (mcr) [5,6]
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