Cockroach Associated Foodborne Pathogens: Distribution and Antibiogram

Cockroaches are among the most common pests in public dwellings and health facilities. Owing to their close association with man and all his surroundings they are consideredas potential carrier and transmitter of human diseases. In hospital, cockroaches are the possible vector of nosocomial infection, specially for the transmission of drug resistant bacteria. The aim of the present study was to identify the major cockroach species, to isolate common foodborne pathogens from cockroach and to determine the antibiotic susceptibility pattern of isolated bacteria. This casecontrol study was conducted on cockroaches captured from hospital, restaurants and houses in Dhaka city, from a period of July to December 2014. A total of 450 cockroaches were collected. Among these 300 cockroaches (150 from hospital and 150 from restaurants) were considered as case and 150 cockroaches from houses were enrolled as control group. All (100%) cockroaches were identified as Blattellagermanica. Examination of external surface and gut homogenates showed that all (100%) cockroaches carried bacteria, while carriage rate of fungi and parasites were 28.2% and 3.7% respectively. Of 1901 isolated bacteria, Escherichia coli (15.3%), Pseudomonas aeruginosa (14.4%) and Salmonella spp.(12.9%) were the predominant bacteria. Other bacteria of medical relevance included,Shigella spp. (6.4%), Klebsiella spp. (8.8%), Proteus spp. (9.6%) and Staphylococcus aureus (4.3%). Antibiotic resistance pattern showed high resistance rate (62.4%) of bacterial isolates to different antibiotics. Additionally, 1051(55.3%) of the isolates were multi drug resistant (MDR) strains, which were resistant to 5-14 antibiotics. The findings of this study revealed that, cockroaches are potential source of pathogenic microorganisms including multi drug resistant bacterial strains, which could be a major threat to public health. Hence, effective preventive and control measures are required to minimize cockroach related infections. Bangladesh Med Res Counc Bull 2018; 44(1):30-38