Food animals, including retail pork, chicken, ground turkey and ground beef have been implicated as sources of Salmonella and Campylobacter and are the leading causes of bacterial foodborne illness. Indicator pathogens, including Escherichia coli and Enterococcus spp., are also frequently isolated from these meat products. The situation is further complicated when the strains are also resistant to different antimicrobials. It is, therefore, important that we monitor the prevalence and trends of antimicrobial resistant (AMR) foodborne bacterial strains in the retail meat products that can eventually pass to the consumers along the farm-to-fork chain resulting in significant public health impact. The National Antimicrobial Resistance Monitoring System (NARMS) plays an important role in surveillance of AMR bacterial pathogens in humans, food animals and retail meats. Though North Carolina is an important food producing state in the US and ranks among the top states in pork and poultry production, it is currently not a part of the NARMS program. Our major objective, therefore, is to enhance the surveillance of AMR pathogenic and indicator bacterial strains in retail meats in North Carolina and generate critical data to contribute to the NARMS mission. We propose to conduct this study in collaboration with the FDA GenomeTrakr program and strong support from the NC Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services (NCDACS). The PI (Dr. Thakur) laboratory is a GenomeTrakr laboratory, which will provide the opportunity to generate the whole genome sequences (WGS) of the bacterial strains thereby significantly assisting us in tracking the emergence of potential new AMR bacterial and allowing the public health agencies to take appropriate steps. The specific objectives of our proposal are: 1) Monitor antimicrobial resistance (AMR) trends in Salmonella, Campylobacter, E. coli and Enterococcus spp. from retail meat samples collected in North Carolina region. 2) Generate and compare the WGS profiles of Salmonella, Campylobacter, E. coli and Enterococcus spp. isolated from retail meat in North Carolina to detect the emergence of new AMR strains. The long-term objective of our proposal is to protect and promote public health by enhancing and strengthening the surveillance of AMR Salmonella, Campylobacter, E. coli and Enterococcus spp. in retail food specimens the US.
The overall objective of our proposal is to protect and promote public health by enhancing and strengthening the surveillance of AMR Salmonella, Campylobacter, Escherichia coli and Enterococcus spp. in retail food specimens in North Carolina and generate critical data to contribute to the NARMS mission. The generation of WGS profiles, as part of the GenomeTrakr network, will allow us to track pathogens at the national and global scales and assist in preventing foodborne outbreaks and safeguarding public health.
