Color-enhanced scanning electron micrograph of Salmonella Typhimurium (red) invading cultured human cellsWIKIMEDIA, ROCKY MOUNTAIN LABORATORIES, NIAID, NIH
The bacteria behind an ongoing outbreak of typhoid fever in Pakistan is a strain of Salmonella enterica that has become resistant to multiple antibiotic treatments by acquiring new DNA, according to a study reported this week (February 20) in mBio.
More than 300 extensively drug-resistant cases of typhoid have been reported in the provinces surrounding Hyderabad, the city in Pakistan where the outbreak began in November 2016. Researchers at the Wellcome Sanger Institute in the United Kingdom have now discovered that the strain of S. enterica, serovar Typhi (Salmonella Typhi), responsible for the outbreak acquired an additional piece of DNA, or plasmid, that made it resistant to three first-line drugs against the illness—chloramphenicol, ampicillin, and trimethoprim-sulfamethoxazole—as well as fluoroquinolones and third-generation cephalosporins.
“Antibiotic resistance has ...
