BEYOND THE HOSPITAL: DETECTION AND CHARACTERIZATION OF VIRULENT ACINETOBACTER BAUMANNII IN RETAIL RAW MEAT

Abstract

The present study was undertaken to determine the occurrence, antimicrobial resistance pattern, and virulence potential of Acinetobacter baumannii isolated from 195 meat samples (chicken, mutton, and beef) marketed in retail outlets in Chennai, India. From the 195 meat samples obtained for the study from retail outlets, 3.07% (6/195) were found to be positive for the presence of A. baumannii established by biochemical characterization and subsequently, PCR targeting species-specific A.b_hyp gene. Antimicrobial resistance profiling done by disc diffusion method revealed the highest prevalence of resistance against chloramphenicol and cefuroxime (100%) followed by ampicillin (50%) and ceftriaxone (33%) while 100% of the isolates were sensitive to co trimoxazole, gentamicin, and tetracycline followed by 83.3% isolates showing sensitivity to ciprofloxacin. On genotypic characterization of antimicrobial resistance genes, it was found that all the isolates represented blaOXA 51-like gene and Int-1gene while the blaTEM gene was present in 50% (3/6) isolates. Out of the 6 isolates which were assessed, 83.3% of isolates showed the presence of motility, 66.67% showed hemolytic ability and 100% showed biofilm formation. All isolates showed the presence of genes encoding for virulence factors namely bap, pgaB, csuE, and OmpA genes, while blaPER-1 was exhibited by 4 (66.67%) of the A.baumannii isolates.