Australian seagulls carry superbugs

They say it's a good chance for a seagull to poop on you. Now, in a startling observation, a team of Australian scientists discovered that in Australia, one in five silver gulls were carrying an antibiotic-resistant bacterium, which could cause a wave of human infections serious. This comes amid alarming alarms about the emergence of antibiotic resistance in many common bacterial species.

These results come from a study conducted by researchers at Murdoch University in Perth, which studied antimicrobial resistance in humans and animals. The report was published on July 10, 2019 at Journal of antimicrobial chemotherapy.

A silver gull (Chroicocephalus novaehollandiae). Image credit: Kate Haskova / Shutterstock

Seagulls are migratory birds that travel long distances, up to 1,600 kilometers from their nest. They feed on leftovers from humans, as well as animal and human wastes and sewage. They become infected with the bacteria of the species Escherichia coli (E. coli) by contact with human feces. This contact probably occurs through spent landfill or sewage.

To prove that this happened, 562 samples were taken from birds from different places in Australia and tested for different bacteria. The species selected for the study was the herring gull, the most common type in Australia, as scientists suspected that drug resistance may be due in part to a human-human interaction, particularly when animals were commonly found in the human environment.

Scientists were shocked to find the presence of high concentrations of E. Antibiotic resistant coli in seagull samples. Researcher Mark O'Dea said, "Seagulls could acquire this pathogen through their opportunistic dietary habits, as they get rid of the remaining human waste and could then spread these resistant bacteria over very long distances."

In addition, many of these bacteria were actually clones of those found in humans in health facilities. This confirmed that they had not been transferred from seagull to seagull, but by contact with human waste.

O'Dea said the risk of transmitting the infection to humans was negligible, but admitted that it could still happen. In most healthy people, bacteria do not cause infection even after ingestion. However, people with weakened immune systems, for example, would be at risk. In addition, when gulls fly across the country, they will be able to spread antibiotic-resistant infection over long distances. In addition, gulls use the same environment as humans, which increases the chances of these superbugs spreading to humans. For example, on beaches or in parks, seagull droppings could be affected by people.

E. coli is usually responsible for human urinary tract infections, sepsis and, in some patients, meningitis. However, some of the bacteria found in gulls were not susceptible to cephalosporin or fluoroquinolone, two commonly used antibiotics. More importantly, a bacterial sample did not show growth inhibition, even when exposed to carbapenem, one of the last reserve drugs, used only to treat serious infections or put the patient at risk. at high risk.

Dr. Sam Abraham, principal investigator, described this initiative as a call to all government and other agencies to properly manage waste.

The World Health Organization has already warned that superbugs are on the rise and has drawn attention to the urgent need to develop new antibiotics that can treat them. "Antimicrobial resistance (antimicrobial resistance) – the ability of bacteria, parasites, viruses and fungi to resist these drugs – threatens to send us back to a time when we were unable to easily treat infections such as pneumonia , tuberculosis, gonorrhea. and salmonellosis. Inability to prevent infections could seriously compromise surgery and procedures such as chemotherapy. "

The European Center for Disease Prevention and Control reported that in 2015, 33,000 deaths were directly related to infection with an antibiotic-resistant bacterium. In fact, medical experts generally consider that increasing antimicrobial resistance is one of the greatest dangers to human health.

The Australian study is not isolated in its conclusions, nor the earliest warning of this kind. In 2017, a French study revealed that the same virus was carried in yellow-legged gulls in the south of France. The authors call it "alarming" and call for urgent detection of the source of contamination. A German study has also shown the presence of antimicrobial resistant Salmonella in wild birds.

WHO has identified factors responsible for the spread of antibiotic resistance, including poor sanitation standards for food handling, poor environmental hygiene, poor sanitary conditions, and poor sanitation. lack of adequate infection control measures. Australian scientists recommend that people who take the simple precaution of washing their hands or using a hand sanitizer after contact with gull faeces, to minimize the risk of infection.