Mycobacterium tuberculosis Population in Northwestern Russia: An Update from Russian-EU/Latvian Border Region

Abstract

This study aimed to characterize the population structure of Mycobacterium tuberculosis in Pskov oblast in northwestern Russia, to view it in the geographical context, to compare drug resistance properties across major genetic families. Ninety M. tuberculosis strains from tuberculosis (TB) patients, permanent residents in Pskov oblast were subjected to LAM-specific IS 6110 -PCR and spoligotyping, followed by comparison with SITVITWEB and MIRU-VNTRplus databases. The Beijing genotype (n = 40) was found the most prevalent followed by LAM (n = 18), T (n = 13), Haarlem (n = 10), Ural (n = 5), and Manu2 (n = 1); the family status remained unknown for 3 isolates. The high rate of Beijing genotype and prevalence of LAM family are similar to those in the other Russian settings. A feature specific for M. tuberculosis population in Pskov is a relatively higher rate of Haarlem and T types. Beijing strains were further typed with 12-MIRU (followed by comparison with proprietary global database) and 3 hypervariable loci QUB-3232, VNTR-3820, VNTR-4120. The 12-MIRU typing differentiated 40 Beijing strains into 14 types (HGI = 0.82) while two largest types were M2 (223325153533) prevalent throughout former USSR and M11 (223325173533) prevalent in Russia and East Asia. The use of 3 hypervariable loci increased a discrimination of the Beijing strains (18 profiles, HGI = 0.89). Both major families Beijing and LAM had similar rate of MDR strains (62.5 and 55.6%, respectively) that was significantly higher than in other strains (21.9%; P = 0.001 and 0.03, respectively). The rpoB531 mutations were more frequently found in Beijing strains while LAM drug resistant strains mainly harbored rpoB516 and inhA −15 mutations. Taken together with a high rate of multidrug resistance among Beijing strains from new TB cases (79.3% versus 44.4% in LAM), these findings suggest the critical impact of the Beijing genotype on the current situation with MDR-TB in the Pskov region in northwestern Russia.

A surge of MDR and XDR tuberculosis in France among patients born in the Former Soviet Union

“…In the present study, the genotyping analysis revealed four lineages (Beijing, LAM, Haarlem and Ural) already reported in the FSU [17][18][19], although the Beijing family was more frequent (68%) in our study. Of interest, the combination of MIRU-VNTR and antibiotic resistance genotypes and phenotypes suggested that almost all strains defined as clustered by MIRU-VNTR were in fact distinct.…”

Characterization of Mycobacterium Tuberculosis Strains (A 15-Year Survey in Leningrad Region, Russia)

“…Нами впервые показано, что среди штаммов M. tuberculosis, выделенных от больных хрони-ческим туберкулезом легких в Ленинградской области, также превалируют представители генетического семейства Beijing, причем их доля возросла с 56, [3,6,9,11,15].…”

Molecular Epidemiology of Tuberculosis in the Kaliningrad Region of Russia: 10 Years After

“…Распределе-ние штаммов LAM в Северо-Западном регионе России неоднородно. Так, если в Карелии и Ле-нинградской области их доля составляла 10,3% (что сопоставимо с Финляндией -7,3%), то в Псковской области превышала 20%, что близ-ко к показателю в Эстонии (17,8%) [1,3,18,24,25]. В Беларуси и Украине штаммы семейства LAM занимают второе место по распростра-ненности (около 23%) после Beijing и в структу-ре МЛУ штаммов (39,5 и 22,9% соответственно) [7,22,28].…”

“…Штаммы Ural (5,5%) были малочислен-ны, что сопоставимо с суммарными данными по СЗФО РФ и Финляндии [2,18,24]. В то же время в последние годы отмечен рост циркуля-ции ассоциированного с МЛУ субтипа семей-ства Ural в ряде стран Восточной Европы (Мол-дова, Литва) и на Северо-Западе России [2,15].…”