Species Diversity and Pheno- and Genotypic Antibiotic Resistance Patterns of Staphylococci Isolated from Retail Ground Meats

The presence and species diversity of staphylococci in 250 ground beef and lamb meat samples obtained from Diyarbakir, Turkey were investigated. The presence of the 16S rRNA gene, mecA, nuc, pvl, and femA was analyzed by multiplex PCR. Pheno‐ and genotypic antibiotic resistance profiles of 208 staphylococci isolates were established. Of the ground beef and ground lamb samples, 86.4% and 62.4% were positive for staphylococci, respectively. Staphylococcus aureus, S. saprophyticus, S. hominis, S. lentus, S. pasteuri, S. warneri, S. intermedius, and S. vitulinus made up 40.8%, 28.8%, 11%, 3.8%, 3.8%, 2.4%, 2.4%, and 2.4% of isolates, respectively. Of the 85 S. aureus isolates, 40%, 47%, and 5.8% carried femA, mecA, and pvl, respectively, whereas the corresponding rates for the 118 coagulase‐negative staphylococci (CoNS) were 0%, 10.1%, and 0%, respectively. We determined from the 208 isolates, the highest antibiotic resistances were to tetracycline and oxytetracycline (85.5%), followed by penicillin (51.4%), novobiocin (45.6%), ampicillin (39.9%), and doxycycline (31.7%), using the Clinical and Laboratory Standards Inst. (CLSI) method. All isolates were sensitive to gentamycin, ofloxacin, and tobramycin, but 2.3% of the S. aureus isolates had resistance to vancomycin. The staphylococci isolates carried tet(K), blaZ, tet(L), tet(W), cat, tet(S), tet(M), ermB, ermA, and ermC antibiotic resistance genes at rates of 59%, 51.7%, 36.9%, 31.8%, 27.2%, 27.2%, 24.4%, 18.1%, 7.9%, and 3.9%, respectively. Practical Application Our study is the 1st to detect pvl in MRSA isolates from ground meat samples in Turkey. Moreover, we detected 2 instances of vancomycin resistance in MRSA isolates and also detected a high level of multidrug resistance in staphylococci isolates. The results of this study show that ground meat can be a source of staphylococci of concern to public health because of potential for pathogenicity and as a reservoir for antibiotic resistance genes.