Abstract
Vibrio cholerae is a leading waterborne pathogen worldwide. Continuous monitoring of V. cholerae contamination in aquatic products and identification of risk factors are crucial for assuring food safety. In this study, we determined the virulence, antimicrobial susceptibility, heavy metal tolerance, and genetic diversity of 400 V. cholerae isolates recovered from commonly consumed freshwater fish (Aristichthys nobilis, Carassius auratus, Ctenopharyngodon idellus, and Parabramis pekinensis) collected in July and August of 2017 in Shanghai, China. V. cholerae has not been previously detected in the half of these fish species. The results revealed an extremely low occurrence of pathogenic V. cholerae carrying the major virulence genes ctxAB (0.0%), tcpA (0.0%), ace (0.0%), and zot (0.0%). However, high incidence of virulence-associated genes was observed, including the RTX toxin gene cluster (rtxA-D) (83.0–97.0%), hlyA (87.8%), hapA (95.0%), and tlh (76.0%). Meanwhile, high percentages of resistance to antimicrobial agents streptomycin (65.3%), ampicillin (44.5%), and rifampicin (24.0%) were observed. Approximately 30.5% of the isolates displayed multidrug resistant (MDR) phenotypes with 42 resistance profiles, which were significantly different among the four fish species (MARI, P = 0.001). Additionally, tolerance of isolates to heavy metals Hg2+ (49.3%), Zn2+ (30.3%), and Pb2+ (12.0%) was observed. The enterobacterial repetitive intergenic consensus-polymerase chain reaction (ERIC-PCR)-based fingerprinting of the 400 V. cholerae isolates revealed 328 ERIC-genotypes, which demonstrated a large degree of genomic variation among the isolates. Overall, the results of this study support the need for food safety risk assessment of aquatic products.
Highlights
Mengjie Xu and Jinrong Wu contributed to this work.Responsible editor: Diane PurchaseElectronic supplementary material The online version of this article contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.Vibrio cholerae can cause cholera, a severe diarrheal disease that can be quickly fatal if untreated and is typically transmitted via contaminated water and person-to-person contact (Baker-Austin et al 2018)
Approximately 28.7% (n = 897), 20.7% (n = 645), 29.5% (n = 922), and 21.1% (n = 659) of the isolates were recovered from the C. auratus, A. nobilis, P. pekinensis, and C. idellus samples, respectively
The significant difference in antimicrobial resistance profiles among the four fish samples was observed (MARI, P = 0.001), suggesting that C. auratus was likely exposed to antimicrobial drugs mostly
Summary
Vibrio cholerae can cause cholera, a severe diarrheal disease that can be quickly fatal if untreated and is typically transmitted via contaminated water and person-to-person contact (Baker-Austin et al 2018). It was estimated that V. cholera caused roughly 2.9 million cases of cholera and 95,000 deaths annually worldwide between 2008 and 2012 (Ali et al 2015). Previous studies highlighted the link between cholera outbreaks and the consumption of raw, undercooked, or mishandled fish products contaminated by V. cholerae. Consumption of dried fish was significantly associated with the 1997 cholera epidemic in a rural area (Ifakara) in southern Tanzania (Acosta et al 2001). It has been reported that the fresh fish imported from Nigeria contributed to the domestic cholera in Germany in 2001
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