Abstract
Members of the family Arcobacteraceae are distributed widely in aquatic environments, and some of its species have been associated with human and animal illness. However, information about the diversity and distribution of Arcobacteraceae in different water bodies is still limited. In order to better characterize the health risk posed by members in the family Arcobacteraceae, a systematic review and meta-analysis-based method was used to investigate the prevalence of Arcobacteraceae species in aquatic environments based on available data published worldwide. The database search was performed using related keywords and considering studies up to February 2021. The pooled prevalence in aquatic environments was 69.2%, ranging from 0.6 to 99.9%. These bacteria have a wide geographical distribution, being found in diverse aquatic environments with the highest prevalence found in raw sewage and wastewater treatment plants (WWTP), followed by seawater, surface water, ground water, processing water from food processing plants and water for human consumption. Assessing the effectiveness of treatments in WWTP in eliminating this contamination, it was found that the wastewater treatment may not be efficient in the removal of Arcobacteraceae. Among the analyzed Arcobacteraceae species, Al. butzleri was the most frequently found species. These results highlight the high prevalence and distribution of Arcobacteraceae in different aquatic environments, suggesting a risk to human health. Further, it exposes the importance of identifying and managing the sources of contamination and taking preventive actions to reduce the burden of members of the Arcobacteraceae family.
Highlights
Proposed in 1991, the genus Arcobacter was included in the family Campylobacteracea, which comprised two more genera, Campylobacter and Sulfurospirillum [1,2]
In 2017, after a comparative genomic analysis of the class Epsilonproteobacteria, a reclassification of the historically denominated Arcobacter genus as a new family denominated Arcobacteraceae was proposed to be included in the class Campylobacteria [5]
Few species from this family have been associated with animal and human disease, among which Aliarcobacter butzleri and Aliarcobacter cryaerophilus have been classified by the International Commission on Microbiological Specification for Food as a serious hazard to human [15]
Summary
Proposed in 1991, the genus Arcobacter was included in the family Campylobacteracea, which comprised two more genera, Campylobacter and Sulfurospirillum [1,2]. Most of the species from this family have been first isolated from aquatic environments [14] Few species from this family have been associated with animal and human disease, among which Aliarcobacter butzleri and Aliarcobacter cryaerophilus have been classified by the International Commission on Microbiological Specification for Food as a serious hazard to human [15]. Despite these two species being the most predominantly associated with human disease, infections with Aliarcobacter skirrowii, Aliarcobacter thereius, Malacobacter mytili and Aliarcobacter lanthieri have been reported [16,17,18,19]. The main aim of this work was to perform a systematic review followed by meta-analysis in order to investigate the prevalence of Arcobacteraceae in different water bodies based on data available worldwide
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