P-021. Incidences and Antimicrobial Resistance of Salmonella Schwarzengrund Isolates from Humans and Chicken in Taiwan

M-H. Chen¹, C-L. Li², Y-C. Yang², C-S. Chiou³, H-Y. Tsen²;
¹Natl. Chung-Hsing Univ., Taichung, TAIWAN, ²Hung-Kuang Univ., Taichung County, TAIWAN, ³Center for Disease Control, Taichung, TAIWAN.

Background: Salmonella Schwarzengrund has been recently recognized as one of the most common Salmonella serotypes contaminated in chicken in Asia area. Thus, investigation of the antibiograms for this Salmonella species is important for prevention of the infection. Methods: In this study, the incidences rates for isolation of S. Schwarzengrund from chicken meats purchased from conventional markets and patients with salmonellosis cases in Taiwan were investigated. Furthermore, 228 S. Schwarzengrund isolates of these chicken isolates obtained in Taiwan during 2000 ~ 2006 and 30 isolates obtained from patients with salmonellosis during 2004 ~ 2006 were assayed for antimicrobial susceptibility. Results: Results showed that the incidence for isolation of S. Schwarzengrund from raw chicken meat was 30.5% while that from humans was 2.8%. Our results revealed the high prevalence of S. Schwarzengrund contaminated in chicken meat in Taiwan. All chicken isolates and human isolates were multidrug resistant and demonstrated high resistance to ampicillin, gentamicin, kanamycin, streptomycin, tetracycline, nalidixic acid, trimethoprim- sulfamethoxazole, and chloramphenicol. Most of the S. Schwarzengrund isolates from humans and chicken are resistant to fluoroquinolones. About 76.8% of the chicken isolates and 63.3% of the human isolates belong to the A-C-S-SXT-T antibiogram R-type, ie, resistant to ampicillin, chloramphenicol, streptomycin, trimethoprim- sulfamethoxazole, and tetracycline. Conclusion: The results imply a possible dissemination of antimicrobial resistance among the medicated humans and the food animals.