Occurrence of Campylobacter on carcasses of slaughtered animals between 2009 and 2013

Abstract

A total of 2668 swabs from poultry (n = 2166), pig (n = 311), and cattle (n = 191) carcasses were collected in slaughterhouses all over Poland and tested for the presence of Campylobacter. It was found that 1319 (49.4%) of them were contaminated with these bacteria. The percentages of the positive samples were different in each year of the study and the highest proportion of Campylobacter contaminated samples occurred in 2009, when 64.1% of investigated carcasses were positive. On the other hand, the lowest prevalence of Campylobacter was observed in 2013, in the last year of the survey. In all kind of carcass samples both C. jejuni and C. coli were identified, although the pork meat was more contaminated with C. coli (75.3% of positive samples) than with C. jejuni (24.7%), whereas poultry was nearly equally positive for C. jejuni and C. coli (50.6% and 49.4% respectively). The analysis of seasonal contamination of the carcasses revealed that more positive results were found during the second half of year than between January and June. The prevalence of Campylobacter showed that in all provinces, except one (Pomorskie), the mean percentage of the positive samples was above 40%. The most contaminated samples were identified in Lubelskie (69.3%) and Zachodniopomorskie (66.3%) regions. The obtained results showed that slaughtered animals in Poland, especially broilers, were often contaminated with Campylobacter, either C. jejuni or C. coli.

Porcine carcasses as an underestimated source of antimicrobial resistant Campylobacter coli

“…In the present study, the majority of C. coli displayed high resistance to streptomycin (an aminoglycoside) and tetracycline, and lower resistance to ciprofloxacin (a fluoroquinolone). Similar results were observed in our previous investigations performed in Poland ( 38 , 40 , 41 ). This information is important in relation to the effectiveness of the treatment of human infections with C. coli , because fluoroquinolones are one of the drugs of choice used in campylobacteriosis ( 43 ).…”

“…In the present investigation, 30.7% of pig carcasses were Campylobacter-positive as tested with a similar method to that applied in the previous studies. Among the contaminated samples, the vast majority of them were positive for C. coli (90.8%), which was a similar finding to that made during the previous studies, where the percentages of such carcasses were from 75.3% to 93.8% (40,41).…”

“…Investigations to determine the Campylobacter prevalence in porcine carcasses were performed by several researchers ( 14 , 20 , 25 , 29 , 30 ). Previous similar studies were also conducted by our group in Poland and revealed that the percentage of such positive carcasses ranged from 26.0% through 30.4% to 36.3% ( 38 , 40 , 41 ). In the present investigation, 30.7% of pig carcasses were Campylobacter -positive as tested with a similar method to that applied in the previous studies.…”

Antibiotic Resistance ofCampylobacterRecovered from Faeces and Carcasses of Healthy Livestock

“…Campylobacter contamination in cattle carcasses are generally low; however, Noormohamed and Fakhr [ 20 ] reported 78% from beef livers which is higher than the 35.2% obtained in this study. Lower isolation rates have also been reported in different countries [ 18 , 21 ].…”

“…Matthew-Belmar et al [ 34 ] and Kramer et al [ 35 ] recorded more C. jejuni (53.5%) than C. coli (46.5%) from pigs in Grenada and UK, respectively. However, higher C. coli than C. jejuni have been recorded in Nigeria [ 36 ], in Ethiopia [ 17 ], and in Poland [ 21 ]. Other studies do show that C. jejuni may coexist with C. coli in pigs but usually the C. jejuni are always present in 10–100-fold lower numbers than C. coli [ 37 ].…”