Research Article
Benie CKD, Dadie A, Guessen
Abstract
Pseudomonas is an agent of food spoiling, but its role in the contamination of certain local products is unknown. The objective of this study was to evaluate the diversity and the prevalence of Pseudomonas species contaminating beef, fresh and smoked fish sold in some markets. A total of 182 samples including 95 beef, 41 fresh fish and 46 smoked fish were collected and analyzed. The Cetrimide Fucidin Cefaloridine (CFC) Base Pseudomonas agar and Cétrimide agar were used for Pseudomonas spp. isolation according to the ISO 6887- 2 standard method. Strains were first characterized by API 20NE, then confirmed by polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR), using 16S rRNA and rpoB genes. Serotyping of the strains of P. aeruginosa was done by a slide agglutination test. The prevalence of Pseudomonas was 97.9%, 87.8% and 63.1% respectively in beef, in fresh fish and in smoked fish. A total of 158 (97.5%) isolates were confirmed as Pseudomonas by 16S rRNA. The prevalence of majority species was 46.8% for P. aeruginosa, 26.6% for P. putida and 8.2% for P. fluorescens. The prevalence of the majority of P. aeruginosa serogroups was 20.3%, 14.9%, 12.2% and 12.2% respectively for O11, O5, O16 and O7 serogroups. The study revealed a high prevalence of P. aeruginosa serogroups which represent a risk for human health. It requires improving the health management of the food chain of the products analyzed to prevent their possible alteration or reduce the risk of infections.