Prevalence and Virulence Characterization of Staphylococcus aureus Isolates from Chicken Meat and Ready to Eat Chicken Products to Assess Hygiene and Consumer Safety

Abstract

Background: Meat and meat products are good source of proteins and essential amino acids for health. These products are contaminated with various pathogens like S. aureus, Salmonella spp, E coli and Listeria spp., S. aureus is one of most important food borne pathogen associated with food products. The present study was carried out to estimate prevalence of S. aureus and their molecular characterization in raw chicken meat and ready-to-eat chicken products in Jabalpur city. Methods: The samples were collected from different retails outlets and processed as per standard microbiological procedures for isolation of S. aureus and subjected further for molecular characterization and processed to assess the prevalence of S. aureus. A total of 100 raw chicken meat and 70 ready to eat chicken meat products (chicken samosa, momos, pattis, tikka, barbeque etc.) have been collected. Result: The overall prevalence of S. aureus was observed 38.82% with 38.00% in raw chicken meat and 40.00% in ready-to-eat chicken (RTE) products. The molecular study revealed that all the S. aureus isolates were positive for 16s ribosomal RNA (rRNA). Out of 66 isolates, 27 (71.05%) from raw chicken meat and 12 (42.85%) from ready to eat chicken meat products isolates were found to be positive for sea gene where as 3 (7.8%) isolates from raw chicken meat and 6 (21.42%) from ready-to-eat chicken products were found positive for nuc gene respectively.