Epidemiological, clinical and microbiological features of Yersinia enterocolitica infections in a community during a four-year period

Antimicrobial Resistance Among Gram-Negative Foodborne Bacterial Pathogens Associated with Foods of Animal Origin

Antimicrobial-resistant foodborne pathogens are acquired primarily through consumption of contaminated food of animal origin or water. While there is much disagreement on the health burden imposed by resistance in foodborne bacterial pathogens, it is generally agreed that the use of antimicrobials, whether for growth promotion, prevention, or treatment, can select for resistant bacterial pathogens, and that these pathogens can be transmitted on food originating from sites processing treated animals. Information on the evolution and dissemination of antimicrobial resistance in foodborne pathogens shows that the situation is complex and differs by organism and antimicrobial. A clearer understanding of the ecology of resistance is needed in order to support science-based assessments of the public health risks due to the use of antimicrobials in the animal husbandry environment.

Class 1 integron-borne gene cassettes in multidrug-resistant Yersinia enterocolitica strains of different phenotypic and genetic types

Seventy nine strains of Yersinia enterocolitica resistant to one or more antimicrobials were analyzed for integrons. Only class 1 sul1 integrons containing aadA1a (28 strains), aadA1a-dfr1-sat1 (2 strains), and dfr1-aadA1a (1 strain) gene cassettes were found. The first two types were found in clinical isolates belonging to serotype O:3, biotypes 2 to 4, and eight combined ribotypes, and the third was found in the reference strain, CECT4054 (O:8). All screened resistance markers were found in strains with and without integrons (except for chloramphenicol resistance, encoded by catA1 gene, which was only present in strains with integrons), but in different resistance profiles (R profiles). A profile (ampicillin, streptomycin, sulfadiazine, and trimethoprim resistance, encoded by the tem1, aadA1a, sul1, and dfr1 genes, respectively) was found in strains, with and without integrons. Integrons and some of the resistance genes are located on plasmids with sizes ranging between 65 and 140 kb. This is the first report of class 1 integrons in Y. enterocolitica.

Genetic heterogeneity of clinical strains of Yersinia enterocolitica traced by ribotyping and relationships between ribotypes, serotypes, and biotypes

A series of 74 Yersinia enterocolitica clinical strains collected in a Spanish region and 10 reference strains, assigned to nine serotypes and five biotypes, were analyzed by ribotyping procedures. Riboprobing, performed separately with HindIII and BglI and using an rrn operon as the probe, generated 13 and 11 ribotypes (discrimination index [DI] = 0.56 and 0.55), respectively. PCR ribotyping, performed with primers complementary to conserved regions of 16S and 23S rRNA genes, generated 13 ribotypes (DI = 0. 56). A combination of data from the three procedures allowed for further discrimination into 17 combined ribotypes (DI = 0.83). The dendrogram obtained by cluster analysis of data from riboprobing indicated a high heterogeneity of the ribosomal DNA regions of the strains under study (similarities between 10 and 92%), which were grouped into three clusters at a similarity level of 0.32. The major cluster included 10 branches, and 7 of these formed a subcluster (similarity coefficient, >83%) represented by strains of serotype O:3 and biotype 2, 3, or 4. The second cluster included four branches, represented by strains belonging to seven non-O:3 serotypes, biotypes 1A and 2, and two of these branches included pyrazinamidase-positive as well as pyrazinamidase-negative strains. The remaining three branches, represented by O:3-biotype 4 strains, formed a third cluster weakly related to the others. Data from this study showed that Y. enterocolitica O:3 organisms assigned to a prevalent and endemic lineage and non-O:3 organisms assigned to three other less-frequent lineages are circulating and causing human disease in the Spanish region under study.

Discriminatory power and application of ribotyping of Yersinia enterocolitica O:3 in an epidemiological study

Ribotyping performed with five restriction endonucleases was used in an attempt to subtype Yersinia enterocolitica serotype O:3 and also as a tool for clonal analysis. DNA from organisms under study (48 isolates from diarrheic human feces, 24 from food, and 5 reference strains) was tested by Southern hybridization using a DNA probe carrying an rRNA operon from Escherichia coli. Strains were grouped into seven ribotypes by the HindIII restriction endonuclease, into five ribotypes by Ncil, Bg/l, and Sa/l; and into two ribotypes by EcoRI, resulting in a discrimination index (DI) of 0.37, 0.17, 0.43, 0.13, and 0.03 for the five endonucleases. By combining the results obtained with two or more restriction endonucleases, a further discrimination was registered, the most efficient combination (in terms of discriminatory power vs. cost in work, time, and money) for routine typing being HindIII-Bg/l (9 types, DI=0.58). In the clonal analysis, results obtained with the five restriction endonucleases allowed us to define 11 groupings or clonal lines, which showed a remarkable degree of genetic heterogeneity (genetic distance coefficients between 0.03 and 0.73) and were grouped into two major clusters. One cluster included 93% of the strains and eight lines. At least two of the most frequent lines can be considered endemic in Asturias, Spain, because organisms belonging to these lines have been circulating and causing human yersiniosis in recent years and have also been isolated from commercial raw meat products. Two Ncil ribotypes from the series under study (92.2% of strains included in the prevalent cluster) were similar but not identical to ribotypes of 0.3 organisms from other geographic areas described in the literature, indicating that the genetic structure of prevalent human pathogens of this serotype is basically clonal.

Interfaces of the yeast killer phenomenon

A new prophylactic and therapeutic antimicrobial strategy based on a specific physiological target that is effectively used by killer yeasts in their natural ecological competition is theorized. The natural system exploited is the yeast killer phenomenon previously adopted as an epidemiological marker for intraspecific differentiation of opportunistic yeasts, hyphomycetes, and bacteria. Pathogenic microorganisms (Candida albicans) may be susceptible to the activity of yeast killer toxins due to the presence of specific cell wall receptors. On the basis of the idiotypic network, we report that antiidiotypic antibodies, produced against a monoclonal antibody bearing the receptor-like idiotype, are in vivo protecting animals immunized through idiotypic vaccination and in vitro mimicking the antimicrobial activity of yeast killer toxins, thus acting as antibiotics.