Researchers isolated MRSA in two rabbits and a shorebird - Antibiotic-Resistant Bugs Go Wild

[Gert van der Hoek]

Antibiotic-Resistant Bugs Go Wild

by Jill U. Adams on 18 October 2012

Bugs bunny. Researchers found MRSA in two Eastern cottontail rabbits.
Credit: Harvey Henkelmann/Wikimedia Commons

One of the most notorious and hard-to-treat bacteria in humans has been found in wildlife, according to a new study in the Journal of Wildlife Diseases.

The researchers isolated methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) in two rabbits and a shorebird. Wild animals may act as an environmental reservoir for the disease from which humans could get infected.

Seven of the animals, or 6.1%, carried S. aureus that was sensitive to methicillin; these included owls, pigeons, a beaver, a heron, and a squirrel. Three animals, or 2.6%, carried MRSA: two Eastern cottontail rabbits and a lesser yellowlegs, a migratory shorebird. (For comparison's sake: An estimated 1.5% of Americans carry MRSA in their noses.)

Perhaps most troubling of all was that one of the pigeons carried a Staphylococcus bacterium that, while still sensitive to methicillin, was resistant to the antibiotic vancomycin.
"Vancomycin is used as a last resort in MRSA infections," says study co-author Shylo Wardyn, a research assistant in Smith's lab, and vancomycin-resistant staph strains are rare in humans.

Read more: Science Mag

thanks to Jay