[Resistance to antimicrobial agents, hemolytic activity and plasmids in Aeromonas species]

A total of 174 Aeromonas isolates consisting of 100 strains from patients with diarrhea being mainly overseas travellers nd healthy subjects, and 74 strains from environmental sources including foods, fish, fresh water, sea water and river soil collected in the area of Tokyo Metropolis and Kanagawa Prefecture was examined for the antimicrobial resistance, presence of plasmids and hemolytic activity. Almost all the isolates (99.4%) were resistant to aminobenzyl penicillin. The isolation frequency of chloramphenicol- or tetracycline-resistant strain was low. Most environmental isolates of A. hydrophila were resistant to multiple antimicrobial agents. Thirty-seven percent of environmental isolates and 39% of human fecal ones carried plasmids. In environmental isolates, seven A. hydrophila and three A. sobria strains carried 63- to 150-kilobase pair (kb) conjugative R plasmids. Two A. hydrophila strains from both the healthy subject and domestic case with diarrhea carried 58- to 90-kb conjugative R plasmids, respectively. None of the isolates from the feces of overseas traveller's diarrhea carried the plasmid. Irrespective of the sources. A. hydrophila showed the highest hemolytic activity among three Aeromonas species. Eighty percent or more of A. hydrophila isolates were of hemolysin positive. The hemolytic titer of A. hydrophila strains from human feces was higher than that of the strains from environmental sources.