Distribution and antimicrobial resistance patterns of Clostridium Perfringens isolated from vaccinated and unvaccinated goats

This project was designed to find out the effect of enterotoxaemia vaccine in reducing C. perfringens infection in goats and to check antibacterial susceptibility against the highest prevailing genotype. A total of 1344 samples were collected randomly from 1008 unvaccinated and 336 vaccinated goats from various managmental systems in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan. Cultured samples were further identified through colony characteristics, Gram staining, and biochemical analysis. Clostridium perfringens was isolated from79.1% (797/1008) unvaccinated and 65.77% (221/336) vaccinated goats which were further genotyped by multiplex PCR. The genotypic analysis showed that in unvaccinated goats out of positive samples 53.07% were C. perfringens type A, 9.79% were type B and 37.1% were of type D. Similarly in case of vaccinated goats 57.01% were type A, 9.05% were type B and 33.94% were of type D. C. perfringens type C and type E were not detected positive in both vaccinated and unvaccinated goats. Vaccination with enterotoxaemia in goats indicated non-significant effect (P < 0.062) on reduction of C. perfringens isolates. Antibiogram study was performed utilizing a total of 17 antibiotics against the prevailing strains in-vitro. Highest sensitivity was recorded for Ceftriaxone followed by Penicillin G, ciprofloxacin, Ofloxacin, Metranidazol and tetracycline while the strains were found resistant to Streptomycin, Colistin Sulphate, Ampicillin, Amoxicilin and Gentamycin.