Genomic and Virulence Characterization of Intrauterine Pathogenic Escherichia coli With Multi-Drug Resistance Isolated From Cow Uteri With Metritis

Abstract

Metritis is a major disease in dairy cows causing animal death, decrease of birth rate, milk production, and economic loss. Antibiotic treatment is generally used to treat such disease but has a high failure rate of 23–35%. The reason for the treatment failure remains unclear, although antibiotic resistance is postulated as one of factors. Our study investigated the prevalence of extended spectrum β-lactamase (ESBL) producing bacteria in uterine samples of cows with metritis and characterized the isolated intrauterine pathogenic Escherichia coli (IUPEC) strains using whole genome sequencing. We found that the cows with metritis we examined had a high percentage of ESBL producing IUPEC with multi-drug resistance including ceftiofur which is commonly used for metritis treatment. The ESBL producing IUPEC strains harbored versatile antibiotic resistance genes conferring resistance against 29 antibiotic classes, suggesting that transmission of these bacteria to other animals and humans may lead to antibiotic treatment failure. Furthermore, these strains had strong adhesion and invasion activity, along with critical virulence factors, indicating that they may cause infectious diseases in not only the uterus, but also in other organs and hosts.

Prevalence and Molecular Characteristics of Extended-Spectrum and AmpC β-Lactamase Producing Escherichia coli in Grazing Beef Cattle

“…and Citrobacter spp., respectively (Jacoby, 2009;Verdet et al, 2009). Due to the increased use of β-lactams and subsequent relocation of ESBL and AmpC β-lactamase genes to plasmids, ESBL/AmpC producing E. coli are widely disseminated into the environment and into the food-producing animals (Blaak et al, 2014;Ma et al, 2018. This allows for zoonotic transmission to humans through contaminated food products, creating a feedback loop for evolution and positive selection of new resistance genes (Ewers et al, 2012;Ibrahim et al, 2016).…”

Analysis of puerperal metritis treatment records in a grazing dairy farm in Argentina

“…One recent study was aimed to investigate the prevalence of extended-spectrum β-lactamase (ESBL) producing bacteria in uterine samples of cows with PM. The results from this study showed that cows with PM had a high per centage of ESBL producing intrauterine pathogenic E. coli with mul tidrug resistance to 29 ATB classes, including ceftiofur [40].…”

Prevalence of extended-spectrum β-lactamases in the local farm environment and livestock: challenges to mitigate antimicrobial resistance

“…Furthermore, human isolates were closely related with avian and dog isolates with 24 and 29 SNPs, respectively (Schaufler et al 2016). Similarly, Ma et al identified identical plasmid groups, IncFIB and FII, and similar virulence factors in intrauterine pathogenic E. coli (IUPEC) strains from different dairy cows using WGS (Ma et al 2018). However, the IUPEC strains were not clonal variants by phylogenetic tree analysis of whole genomes, revealing no animal to animal transmission of IUPEC (Ma et al 2018).…”

“…Similarly, Ma et al identified identical plasmid groups, IncFIB and FII, and similar virulence factors in intrauterine pathogenic E. coli (IUPEC) strains from different dairy cows using WGS (Ma et al 2018). However, the IUPEC strains were not clonal variants by phylogenetic tree analysis of whole genomes, revealing no animal to animal transmission of IUPEC (Ma et al 2018). Therefore, we propose that accurate and correct understanding of gene and ARM transmission using highresolution tools such as WGS is pivotal to identify transmission origin and route of ESBL-producing bacteria at the interfaces of livestock and the environment.…”