Co-occurrence of Antibiotic and Heavy Metal Resistance in Kizilirmak River Isolates

Contamination of surface waters with antimicrobials has become an increasing public health concern because of the emergence of multi-resistant pathogens. For this reason, water samples collected from the Kizilirmak River-Kirikkale, Turkey were analysed to learn more about the co-occurrence of heavy metal and antibiotic resistance in bacteria. Resistant profiles were determined by using 26 antibiotics and 17 heavy metals. Out of 290, 24 isolates with both heavy metal and antibiotic resistance were determined. Resistance to heavy metals including lead, tin, nickel, barium, aliminum, strontium, silver and lithium varied between 50 and 92 %. More than 50 % of the isolates showed resistance to cephalosporin, quinolone, sulfonamide and aminoglycoside type of antibiotics. The discharge of antimicrobials to water bodies may cause a combined effect of selection and co-selection towards resistant bacteria. Therefore, surface waters may be potential hot spots of the evolution of heavy metal-and antibiotic-resistant bacteria and require special scientific consideration.