Done By Ms Alambo K.S Mssusa B.Pharm IV 2002

Supervised by Ms D. Mloka

ABSTRACT
Minced beef collected from 18 randomly conveniently located butcheries in Karikoo, Kisutu and Ferry, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania were sampled for enteric aerobic microorganisms.
The collected samples were aseptically cultured on Blood and MacConkey agar aerobically for 18hours at 370 C. Four Salmonella sps isolates, two Klebsiella sps, seven E.coli sps, three Proteus sps and two Pseudomans aeruginosa isolates were isolated from the specimens.

The drug susceptibility pattern of these isolates was tested against Nalidixic acid, Gentamicin, Benzyl penicillin, Cotrimaxozole, Ampicillin, Erythromycin, ciprofloxacillin, Chloromphenicol, streptomycin and tetracycline by the disc diffusion method. 100% of all isolates were found to be resistant to Ampicillin, penicillin G, streptomycin and tetracycline. In addition 28.6% E.coli isolates were resistant to Nalidixic acid. All isolates except Pseudomonas were sensitive to Co-trimoxazole, Chloromphenicol, Erythromycin, Gentamicin, Ciprofloxacillin .
All Pseudomonas isolates were resistant to Ampicillin, tetracycline, streptomycin, pen G, Erythromycin, and Co-trimoxazole but were susceptible to chloromphenicol, gentamicin, ciprofloxacillin, and nalidixic acid.

In this study we showed that minced sold in Dar es Salaam is contaminated with potentially pathogenic aerobic enteric bacteria. We were also able to demonstrate that the isolated bacteria were multiple drug resistant with Pseudomonas aeruginosa isolates carrying the highest markers for drug resistance.

We thus conclude that the there are poor meat handling practices among meat handlers of Dar es Salaam and that minced meat may act as reservoir for infectious drug resistant pathogens. We suspect that this reservoir of infectious drug resistant pathogens could have arisen as result of the poor regulation of antimicrobials intended for use in the veterinary and agricultural practices in Tanzania.

We recommend that regulations of antibiotics should be strengthened and that public education on the associated health risks of the promiscuous use of drugs in livestock production be emphasized so as to curb widespread drug resistance bacteria both in animals and humans.