The emergence of multidrug resistance (MDR) among methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) has become a significant threat worldwide. Thus, the current work was designed to elucidate the prevalence and antimicrobial susceptibility patterns of S. aureus among meat and meat products’ samples in Egypt and to determine the virulence genes profiles of MDR biofilm-producing MRSA isolates. A total of 150 samples were obtained from bovine meat (n= 30) and meat products (n= 120) samples in Sharkia Governorate, Egypt. Conventional identification techniques detected 50 (33.3%) staphylococcal isolates (32.8%); 28 (18.7%) were classified as S. aureus and 22 (14.7%) were identified as coagulase-negative staphylococci (CoNS). All the examined S. aureus isolates were resistant to oxacillin and cefoxitin. Meanwhile, the lowest resistance patterns were detected against chloramphenicol, and ceftriaxone (28.6% each). Of note, 21 S. aureus isolates (75%) were MDR and they were recognized phenotypically as strong biofilm producers. The genes icaA, sea, pvl, and eta were detected in 100, 76.2, 42.9, and 33.3% MDR biofilm-producing MRSA isolates, respectively. Interestingly, 8 MDR MRSA (38.1%) were multi-virulent (harbored 3 or more virulence genes). In essence, our results displayed the role of retail meat as a possible source for the spread of multi-virulent MDR biofilm-producing MRSA in Egypt, thus more focus should be placed on continuous monitoring of antimicrobial utilization with the requirement for effective control strategies against multi-virulent MRSA.
Keywords | Staphylococcus aureus, MRSA, Multidrug-resistant, Biofilm producing MRSA, Virulence genes, icaA gene, pvl gene, eta gene, sea gene