Occurrence of antibiotic and metal resistance in bacteria from organs of river fish

Bacterial populations in some organs, viz., liver, spleen, kidney, gill, and arborescent organ of the catfish Clarias batrachus were enumerated followed by determination of resistance for antibiotics and metals. The total viable counts in these organs, observed, were 2.24 x 10(4), 2.08 x 10(4), 1.44 x 10(4), 1.23 x 10(4), and 6.40 x 10(3) colony-forming units/mL, respectively. The random bacterial isolates from these fish organs showed resistance in decreasing order for colistin (98%), ampicillin (82%), gentamycin (34%), carbenicillin (28%), tetracyline (20%), streptomycin (12%), and ciprofloxacin (02%). Most of the isolates exhibited an increasing order of tolerance for the metals (mug/mL) copper (100), lead (200), manganese (400), cadmium (200), and chromium (50), with minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) ranging from < 50 to 1600 mug/mL. These observations indicate that the significant occurrence of bacterial population in,organs of fish with high incidence of resistance for antibiotics and metals may pose risk to fish fauna and public health. (C) 2004, Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.