Prevalence and antimicrobial resistance patterns of Campylobacter spp. isolated from retail meat in Lahore, Pakistan

Campylobacter spp. is a leading cause of gastroenteritis in humans. Contaminated food of animal origin is considered to be the common source. Some of these bacteria are multi-drug resistant, which results in treatment complications. Indiscriminate use of antimicrobial drugs has been suggested to be largely responsible for resistance in zoonotic pathogens including Campylobacter. This study was conducted to determine the prevalence and antimicrobial resistance pattern of Campylobacter isolated from meat of three different food animal species sold at retail shops in Lahore, Pakistan. A total of 125 Campylobacter were isolated and tested for antimicrobial resistance against nine commonly used antibiotics in veterinary and human medicine. The highest resistance was observed against enrofloxacin (79.2%) followed by tylosin (77.6%), ciprofloxacin and amoxicillin (71.2% each), colistin (69.6%), neomycin (32.8%), nalidixic acid (31.2%), gentamicin (25.6%) and doxycycline (8.8%). Most of the isolates (90.4%) were resistant to more than two antibiotics and were considered as multi-drug resistant bacteria. The results indicate that antibiotic resistant bacteria are prevalent in animal meat in Pakistan probably due to uncontrolled use of antibiotics in food animals, thus posing a threat to public health.