ABSTRACT
A total of 200 stool samples from children below 10 yr suffering from diarrhoea were screened for enteric pathogens with special interest on Aeromonas. Aeromonas spp were isolated from 6.5 per cent of the patients, comprising 4 per cent A. hydrophila, 2 per cent A. sobria and 0.5 per cent A. caviae. Among the 13 isolates obtained, 10 isolates produced enterotoxin in ligated rabbit ileal loops, and 11 produced cytotoxin in HEp 2 cells. Many of the Aeromonas isolates exhibited resistance to commonly used antibiotics such as trimethoprim, sulphdiazine, chloramphenicol and tetracycline. None of the stool samples obtained from 52 age matched control children yielded Aeromonas species. Four isolates of Salmonella typhi, 7 of S. paratyphi A, 6 of Shigella flexneri, 4 of Sh. dysenteriae and 3 isolates of Vibrio cholerae (Ogawa) were also recovered during the study. Among the samples analyzed, one from a 7 yr old female patient, had A. hydrophila with S. paratyphi A. The results of this study indicate that drug resistant enteropathogenic Aeromonas is also an important etiological agent of childhood diarrhoea in Chennai.