Virulence and Antibiotics Susceptibility Genes in Bacillus species Isolated from Freshly Expressed Breast Milk

Virulence and Antibiotics Susceptibility Genes in Bacillus species Isolated from Freshly Expressed Breast Milk

Author(s): Margaret Toluwalayo Arowolo
Citation: MT Arowolo, AO Adelowotan, MS Sanusi. (2024). Virulence and Antibiotics Susceptibility Genes in Bacillus species Isolated from Freshly Expressed Breast Milk. Journal of Dental Research and Treatment. The Geek Chronicles. 1(1): 1-19
Address / Description:

1 Department of Microbiology, University of Lagos, Akoka, Lagos, Nigeria

2 Department of Biomedical Sciences, Faculty of Health Sciences, University of Johannesburg, South Africa

Copyright: © 2024 MT Arowolo, this is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Received On: March 20, 2024
Accepted On: March 25, 2024
Published On: April 13, 2024
Abstract:

Breast milk can sometimes spread acute infections from bacterial and viral agents to babies. There are several recognised instances of infections caused by several microorganisms contracted through breast milk. Bacilli are Gram-positive, aerophilic, spore-producing bacteria that are ubiquitous in the environment. They are found not only in the ground, dirt, and water but also in vegetation, animals, and people. The genus Bacillus encompasses a very significant number of species as it has experienced massive taxonomic growth with the application of 16SrRNA sequencing. This research work was focused on the isolation and molecular identification, determining the presence of virulence genes (hblA, hblD, nheA, nheB and cesB), antibiotics resistance genes (blaVIM, vanA and vanB), and antimicrobial susceptibility of eighteen Bacillus species isolates obtained from freshly expressed breast milk (these isolates were predominantly isolated from mothers within the first 6 weeks of lactation). The result obtained indicated that all the Bacillus isolates were motile, spore formers and could not form biofilm. They were all susceptible to ciprofloxacin (100%) and resistant to ceftazidime and lincomycin (100%). All the isolates showed a distinctive band of suitable size of around 300bp for the molecular identification except isolate 12. The antibiotics resistant genes (blaVIM, vanA and vanB) were absent. Bacillus cereus possessed most of the virulence genes. nheB gene had the highest occurrence 50.0 % followed by hblA gene 33.3 %, hblD gene 16.6 %, cesB gene 5.56% while none of the isolates screened had the nheA gene. Based on these findings, we conclude that breast milk, when not properly handled or when there is little or no observation of strict hygiene practices by the breast-feeding mother, can harbor pathogenic microorganisms such as Bacillus species which possess virulence genes as well as increase the rate of spread of antibiotics resistance from mothers to infants.

Keywords: Breast milk, Bacillus species, Virulence genes, Antibiotics susceptibility, Antibiotics resistance genes.

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