Investigation of Antibiotic Resistome in Hospital Wastewater during the COVID-19 Pandemic: Is the Initial Phase of the Pandemic Contributing to Antimicrobial Resistance?
Environ Sci Technol
; 56(21): 15007-15018, 2022 Nov 01.
Article
in English
| MEDLINE | ID: covidwho-1972504
ABSTRACT
Since the COVID-19 pandemic started, there has been much speculation about how COVID-19 and antimicrobial resistance may be interconnected. In this study, untreated wastewater was sampled from Hospital A designated to treat COVID-19 patients during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic alongside Hospital B that did not receive any COVID-19 patients. Metagenomics was used to determine the relative abundance and mobile potential of antibiotic resistant genes (ARGs), prior to determining the correlation of ARGs with time/incidence of COVID-19. Our findings showed that ARGs resistant to macrolides, sulfonamides, and tetracyclines were positively correlated with time in Hospital A but not in Hospital B. Likewise, minor extended spectrum beta-lactamases (ESBLs) and carbapenemases of classes B and D were positively correlated with time, suggesting the selection of rare and/or carbapenem-resistant genes in Hospital A. Non-carbapenemase blaVEB also positively correlated with both time and intI1 and was copresent with other ARGs including carbapenem-resistant genes in 6 metagenome-assembled genomes (MAGs). This study highlighted concerns related to the dissemination of antimicrobial resistance (AMR) during the COVID-19 pandemic that may arise from antibiotic use and untreated hospital wastewater.
Keywords
Full text:
Available
Collection:
International databases
Database:
MEDLINE
Main subject:
COVID-19
/
Anti-Bacterial Agents
Type of study:
Observational study
Limits:
Humans
Language:
English
Journal:
Environ Sci Technol
Year:
2022
Document Type:
Article
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