Prevalence of antibiotic-resistant pathogenic bacteria from canal bank soils in and around Kolkata, India

ABSTRACT

The sewage canals of Kolkata, India are substantially polluted by heavily populated human habitats on their banks. This study, for the first time, throws light on the prevalence of antibiotic-resistant pathogens in those canal bank soils. Eighty-three percent of them showed resistance to amoxycillin and cefotaxime. Pathogens of Bagbazar canal soil demonstrated exceptionally high MIC ranges of amoxycillin. Pathogenic bacteria of agricultural furrow soil (AFS) samples from the outskirts of Kolkata were much smaller in number, and showed complete antibiotic sensitivity.

KEYWORDS:

• Amoxycillin
• antibiotic
• resistance
• pathogens
• canal
• soil

Acknowledgments

The authors wish to express their gratitude to the Department of Microbiology, Sarsuna College, Kolkata; Department of Biotechnology, St. Xavier’s College (Autonomous), Kolkata; and the Department of Biochemistry, University of Calcutta.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Health and safety

All mandatory laboratory health and safety procedures have been complied with in the course of conducting all the experimental works reported in this paper.

Supplementary material

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed here

Additional information

Funding

This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.