Antimicrobial resistance of Enterococcus spp. isolated from Thai fermented pork in Chiang Rai Province, Thailand.

OBJECTIVES: The aim of this study was to evaluate the prevalence of antimicrobial-resistant phenotypes and genes of Enterococcus spp. in order to explore the range of resistance profiles from Thai traditional fermented pork.

METHODS: A total of 120 Thai fermented pork specimens were collected in Chiang Rai, Thailand. Antimicrobial resistance among isolated enterococci to 11 antimicrobial agents was determined by the agar disk diffusion method. Antibiotic resistance genes from resistant phenotypes and virulence genes were observed.

RESULTS: A total of 119 enterococci were found contaminating the collected samples. The most prevalent species was Enterococcus faecalis (68.9%), followed by Enterococcus hirae (16.0%), Enterococcus faecium (13.4%) and Enterococcus gallinarum (1.7%). The highest percentage of resistance was to ciprofloxacin (97.5%), followed by erythromycin (78.2%) and tetracycline (67.2%), whilst high-level gentamicin- and streptomycin-resistant isolates were of lower frequency (7.6% and 22.7%, respectively). All isolates were susceptible to the clinically important agents vancomycin and teicoplanin. Overall, a relatively high frequency of multidrug-resistant (MDR) enterococci was observed (76.2%). Antimicrobial-resistant phenotypes were found to carry aacA-aphD, addE, erm(B), mefA/E, cat, tet(L) and tet(M) resistance genes. Virulence genes were also evaluated and the gelE gene was found to be the most common (37.8%).

CONCLUSIONS: These data highlight the importance of MDR enterococci in fermented pork in Thailand. This is the first report to detect the unusual species E. hirae carrying the mefA/E macrolide resistance gene. These clinically important and unusual enterococci isolates from Thai fermented pork could be a source of transferable resistance genes to other bacteria.