A high prevalence of Campylobacter in retail beef livers and their antimicrobial resistance raise concern about the safety of these retail products, according to Aneesa Noormohamed and Mohamed K. Fakhr of the University of Tulsa in Oklahoma.

In a recent paper in International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, they report a study were to determine the prevalence of Campylobacter jejuni and Campylobacter coli in retail beef, beef livers and pork meats purchased from the Tulsa area and to characterise the isolates obtained through antimicrobial susceptibility testing.

A total of 97 chilled retail beef (50 beef livers and 47 other cuts) and 100 pork samples were collected.

The prevalence of Campylobacter in beef livers was 39/50 (78 per cent) while no Campylobacter was isolated from the other beef cuts.

The prevalence in pork samples was 2/100 (2.0 per cent).

A total of 108 Campylobacter isolates (102 beef livers isolates and six pork isolates) were subjected to antimicrobial resistance profiling against 16 different antimicrobials that belong to eight different antibiotic classes.

Of the six pork Campylobacter coli isolates, four showed resistance to all antimicrobials tested.

Among the beef liver isolates, the highest antibiotic resistances were to tetracyclines and Β-lactams, while the lowest resistances were to macrolides, aminoglycosides, lincosamides and phenicols. Resistances to the fluoroquinolone, macrolide, aminoglycoside, tetracycline, b-lactam, lincosamide and phenicol antibiotic classes were significantly higher in Campylobacter coli than Campylobacter jejuni isolates.

Multidrug Resistance (MDR) among the 102 Campylobacter (33 Campylobacter jejuni and 69 Campylobacter coli) beef liver isolates was significantly higher in Campylobacter coli (62 per cent) than Campylobacter jejuni (39 per cent).

Reference

^{Noormohamed, A. and M.K. Fakhr, M.K. 2013. A higher prevalence rate of Campylobacter in retail beef livers compared to other beef and pork meat cuts. Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2013, 10, 2058-2068. doi:10.3390/ijerph10052058}