The Prevalence of Aliarcobacter Species in the Fecal Microbiota of Farm Animals and Potential Effective Agents for Their Treatment: A Review of the Past Decade

Abstract

There is an endless demand for livestock-originated food, so it is necessary to elucidate the hazard points for livestock breeding. Pathogens are one of the hazard points that threaten the biosecurity of farm-animal breeding and public health. As a potential foodborne pathogen, Aliarcobacter is a member of the intestinal microbiota of farm animals with and without diarrhea. Aliarcobacter spp. are capable of colonizing livestock intestines and are transmitted through the feces. Hence, they endanger slaughterhouses and milk products with fecal contamination. They also have other, rarer, vertical and horizontal transmission routes, including the offspring that abort in farm animals. Gastrointestinal symptoms and abort cases demonstrate potential financial losses to the industry. Viewed from this perspective, the global circulation of farm-animal products is a significant route for zoonotic agents, including Aliarcobacter. In the last decade, worldwide prevalence of Aliarcobacter in fecal samples has ranged from 0.8% in Italy to 100% in Turkey. Furthermore, antibiotic resistance is recognized as a new type of environmental pollutant and has become a hot topic in animal breeding and the food industry. Increasing antibiotic resistance has become a significant problem impacting productivity. The increase in antimicrobial resistance rates in Aliarcobacter is caused by the misuse of antimicrobial drugs in livestock animals, leading to the acquiring of resistance genes from other bacteria, as well as mutations in current resistance genes. The most resistant strains are A. butzleri, A. cryaerophilus, and A. skirrowii. This review analyzes recent findings from the past decade on the prevalence of Aliarcobacter in the intestinal microbiota and the current effective antibiotics against Aliarcobacter. The paper also highlights that A. cryaerophilus and A. skirrowii are found frequently in diarrheal feces, indicating that Aliarcobacter should be studied further in livestock diarrheal diseases. Moreover, Aliarcobacter-infected farm animals can be treated with only a limited number of antibiotics, such as enrofloxacin, doxycycline, oxytetracycline, and gentamicin.

Nanopore Sequencing Assessment of Bacterial Pathogens and Associated Antibiotic Resistance Genes in Environmental Samples

“…Further, the high abundance of the Aliarcobacter genus reads is due to species such as Aliarcobacter cryaerophilus [37], which 2023, 11, 2834 9 of 13 are potential foodborne pathogens. The Aliarcobacter species are members of intestinal microbiota of farm animals, being transmitted through feces and ending up contaminating the slaughterhouses and products [38]. Acinetobacter and Acidovorax are generally abundant in soils, wastewater, and wet environments, the latter being a pathogen for plants and specific to polluted environments [39,40].…”

Widespread Multidrug Resistance of Arcobacter butzleri Isolated from Clinical and Food Sources in Central Italy

“…Arcobacter spp., and particularly A. butzleri , have gained increasing clinical significance in recent years. Due to their capacity to colonize several ecological niches, association with water reservoirs [ 18 ], and their presence in the intestinal tract and feces of healthy as well as diseased animals [ 54 ], contamination of food matrices of different categories by Arcobacter species may occur with a certain probability, and indeed it has been described worldwide [ 9 , 44 ]. Human infection occurs mainly through the ingestion of contaminated products, and fecal contamination of foods during various stages of production has been considered as the main route of contamination [ 55 ].…”

The occurrence of some foodborne pathogens recovered from poultry meat in Shahrekord, Iran

“…Poultry is an imperative reservoir of A. butzleri [ 28 – 30 ]. It is considered a source of infection transmission and spread [ 28 , 29 ].…”