Vancomycin intermediate resistant Staphylococcus aureus in the nasal cavity of asymptomatic individuals: a potential public health challenge.

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The potential of transmitting multidrug resistant Staphylococcus aureus from asymptomatic individuals to healthy individuals could constitute a great challenge to antimicrobial therapy. The antibiograms of the S. aureus from asymptomatic individuals were determined by disk diffusion and agar dilution assay techniques with different antibiotics and vancomycin. Of the 152 S. aureus isolated, (59)38.8% isolates were multi-drug resistant strains. Streptomycin was the most effective and inhibited (135)88.82% of the isolates while ceftazidime inhibited (24)15.8% of the isolates. While (82)54.0% of the isolates inhibited by cefuroxime had resistant colonies within their inhibition zones (Rc) and ofloxacin inhibited (100)65.8% of the isolates without having resistant colonies within the inhibition zones, ceftazidime inhibited (7)4.6% of the isolates with resistant colonies within the inhibition zones. Subjecting the isolates to vancomycin showed that (27)17.8% were resistant to 2 µg/ml, (43)28.3% were resistant to 4 µg/ml and (27)17.8% of the isolates were simultaneously resistant to both concentrations of vancomycin. Although (100)65.8% of the isolates had MARindex ≥0.2, (52)34.2% of the isolates had MARindex ≤ 0.2 and (65)428% of the isolates were considered multidrug resistant strains. The isolation of multi-drug and vancomycin intermediate resistant strains of S. aureus in high percentage, in this study, presents a great threat to clinicians and general populace. The vancomycin intermediate resistant S. aureus (VISA) in asymptomatic individuals could be a critical concern to the therapeutic dilemma to be added to the presence of multi-drug resistance. A more sustainable therapy must be in place to prevent its dissemination or the outbreak of its infection.