Revealing an Abundance of Microbial Fecal Contamination and Multidrug Resistant Bacteria in the Mississippi Gulf Coast

• Published in: Water (Basel) 2023-07, Vol.15 (13), p.2339
• Main Authors: Mukherjee, Maitreyee, Cuthbert, Robyn E, Aitken, Emma, Gay, Kristi A, McKinney, Katonia, Brooks, John P
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Antibiotics; Antimicrobial agents; Bacteria; Coasts; Coliforms; Contamination; Disease control; Drug resistance; E coli; Enterococcus; Environmental management; Escherichia coli; Fecal coliforms; Feces; Infections; Medical equipment and supplies industry; Medical test kit industry; Microbial contamination; Microorganisms; Mississippi; Multidrug resistance; Multidrug resistant organisms; multiple drug resistance; Pathogens; Public health; Recreation; Salinity; Surface water; water; Water analysis; Water quality; Water sampling
• ISSN: 2073-4441; 2073-4441
• DOI: 10.3390/w15132339

(1) Background: The Mississippi Gulf Coast (MGC) has been greatly affected by microbial contamination-related issues in the past several years. (2) Methods: We analyzed water samples collected from ten sites within the MGC across ten months for FIBs and the distribution of AMR/MDR bacteria. (3) Results: The Escherichia coli numbers within nine out the ten studied sites and Enterococcus values within seven out of the ten sites fell well past the water quality criteria established by EPA. Overall, we found very high AMR within both E. coli and Enterococcus isolates, many of which were also MDR. Within the E. coli, 94.6% were resistant to ≥2 antibiotics, 64.5% to ≥3, 41.8% to ≥4, 18.2% to ≥5, and 6.3% to ≥5 antibiotics. MDR patterns in Enterococcus were 87.3% belonging to the ≥2 category, 66.4% belonging to the ≥3, 37.9% falling into the ≥4, 17.9% were in the ≥5, 8.4% in the ≥6, and 3.6% in the ≥7 antibiotics. (4) Conclusions: Overall, data collected suggest the prevalence of concerning levels of FIBs along the Mississippi Gulf Coast revealing a remarkably high percentage of these FIBs being resistant to multiple antibiotics, a concerning number of which were also found to be MDR.