Microbial safety of drinking jar water and antimicrobial resistant pattern against Escherichia coli in jar water at Chittagong, Bangladesh

Opportunist pathogens Escherichia coli and Salmonella spp. enter into human body through consumption of drinking water, causes different gastrointestinal disorders like diarrhea, dysentery and water borne infections like cholera, typhoid etc.. This study was carried out to determine the microbial safety of drinking jar water and antimicrobial resistant pattern against Escherichia coli in jar water samples at Chittagong, Bangladesh. About 189 drinking jar water samples were collected from 63 water treatment plants and market store over a period of two months. Most probable number (MPN) test was done to detect the coliforms in drinking water samples. The MPN number was high (63) after 24 hours incubation. The test results showed that 41 (21%) water samples has presence of coliforms and 27 (14%) plant water samples contain E. coli. But unfortunately Salmonella Spp. was not found in any of the samples. Conformation test of E. coli were performed by Polymeric Chain Reaction (PCR). The E. coli isolates were susceptible to Enrofloxacin (100%), Cephradine (100%), and Gentamycin (92.59%) with an intermediate sensitivity to Amoxicillin (7.40%) and Ceftriaxone (3.70%). The organisms showed 81.48%, 74.02% and 70.30% resistance to Ampicillin, Colistinsulphate, and amoxicillin respectively. So bacteriological assessment of all water sources for drinking should be planned and conducted on regular basis for considering the public health significance of these zoonotic pathogen that are transmitted through drinking jar water.