ISSN 2736-1756
Advanced Journal of Microbiology Research Vol. 2012
Available online at http://internationalscholarsjournals.org/journal/ajmr
© 2012 International Scholars Journals
Full Length Research Paper
Antibiotic resistance profile of Escherichia coli from clinically healthy pigs and their commercial farm environments
Chikwendu C. I.*, Nwabueze R. N. and Anyanwu B. N.
Department of Microbiology, School of Science, Federal University of Technology, P. M. B. 1526 Owerri, Imo State, Nigeria.
Accepted 5 February, 2012
Abstract
The study was conducted to determine the antibiotic resistance profile of Escherichia coli isolated from clinically healthy pigs and their commercial farm environments. Differential and selective media were used to isolate a total of 142 E. coli strains from 202 samples. These were tested against 16 antibiotics using the disc diffusion method. The isolates showed high resistance rates to Cefuroxime (89.4%), Nitrofurantoin (89.4%), Tetracycline (74.6%), Ceftazidime (73.9%), Cefotaxime (72.5%) and Cephalexin (53.5%). Rates of resistance to Septrin and Chloramphenicol were moderate (12.7 to 39.4%), while low rates were recorded for Gentamycin (0.09%), Ciprofloxacine (0.08%), Perfloxacine (0.05%), Augumentine (0.06%), Nalidixic acid (0.07%), Streptomycin (0.05%) and Ofloxacine (0.05%). A total of 78 resistance patterns were identified. The high rates of resistance, as well as the large number of resistant patterns recorded in the absence of the use of antibiotics for growth promotion or as prophylactics suggested that antibiotics are not the only selective factors for antibiotic resistance.
Key words: Escherichia coli, antibiotics, resistance, clinically healthy, prophylaxis