Prevalence and Antibiotic Resistance Patters of Escherichia Coli Isolated From Milk and Milk Product

Milk contains many nutrients including carbohydrate, protein, fat, vitamins and minerals. Milk protein has high nutritional value because it contains all the essential amino acids. Considering the nutritive value, milk is widely consumed by the people as an ideal food. The biochemical changes in milk and milk products by microorganisms can be either desirable or undesirable. The safety of milk and milk products with respect to food borne diseases is of great concern around the world. Therefore, the present study was undertaken to determine the prevalence of Escherichia coli in milk and milk product with their antibiogram assay. A total of 150 milk and milk product (yogurt) samples were collected from Rajshahi Metropolitan area of Bangladesh and analyzed by cultural, staining and biochemical tests for the isolation and identification of E. coli. Antibiogram assay of all the isolates were done by disk diffusion method. The overall prevalence of E. coli was 20.0% in milk and milk product (yogurt) in Rajshahi Metropolitan area. The prevalence of E. coli was 26.0% and 34.0% in raw milk and in milk product (yogurt), respectively. E. coli was not detected in pasteurized milk in this study. In antibiogram assay, isolated E. coli showed 100.0%, 60.0%, 40.0%, 40.0%, 33.3%, 33.3%, 20.0%, and 10.0% resistance to penicillin, gentamycin, ampicillin, streptomycin, amoxycillin, sulfamethoxasole-trimethoprim, nalidixic acid, and ciprofloxacin, respectively. The isolates also showed 73.3%, 60.0%, 53.3%, 53.3%, 30.0%, 23.3%, and 20% sensitive to ciprofloxacin, nalidixic acid, sulfamethoxasole-trimethoprim, streptomycin, amoxycillin, ampicillin, and gentamycin, respectively. The findings of this experiment speculated that the use of ciprofloxacin and nalidixic acid may have the preference in the clinical control of milk borne E. coli infection in Bangladesh. J. Bio-Sci. 29(2): 81-91, 2021 (December)