Hygiene: microbial strategies to reduce pathogens and drug resistance in clinical settings

Healthcare-associated infections (HAIs) are a global concern, affecting all western hospitals, and profoundly impairing the clinical outcome of up to 15% of all hospitalized patients. Persistent microbial contamination of hospital surfaces has been suggested to contribute to HAIs onset, representing a reservoir for hospital pathogens. On the other hand, conventional chemicals-based sanitation do not prevent recontamination and can select drug-resistant strains, resulting in over 50% of surfaces persistently contaminated. There is therefore an urgent need for alternative sustainable and effective ways to control pathogens contamination and transmission. Toward this goal, we recently reported that a probiotic-based sanitation can stably decrease surface pathogens up to 90% more than conventional disinfectants, without selecting resistant species. This paper summarizes some of our most significant results.