Prevalence and fluoroquinolone resistance of Campylobacter spp. isolated from beef cattle in Japan

Beef is a source of human Campylobacter infections. Antimicrobial treatment is needed when patients are immunocompromised or have other comorbidities. Therefore, we investigated the prevalence and antimicrobial resistance of Campylobacter spp. in beef cattle in Japan. Rectal swab samples were collected from 164 beef cattle at an abattoir between March 2021 and August 2021, and Campylobacter spp. were isolated from 94 (57.3%) cattle. C. jejuni and C. coli were isolated from 68 and 26 cattle, respectively. For Campylobacter jejuni, the resistant rates against ampicillin, tetracycline and ciprofloxacin were 20.6, 75.0 and 64.7%, respectively. For C. coli, the resistant rates against ampicillin, tetracycline and ciprofloxacin were 53.8, 76.9 and 88.5%, respectively. No Campylobacter isolates were resistant to erythromycin. By multilocus sequence typing, C. jejuni and C. coli isolates were classified into 22 and 2 sequence types (STs). The top three STs of C. jejuni were ST806 (12 isolates), ST21 (nine isolates), and ST459 (eight isolates). The most frequent ST of C. coli was ST1068 (23 isolates). The results suggest that Campylobacter spp. are prevalent in the gastrointestinal tract of beef cattle slaughtered at abattoirs. Furthermore, the administration of erythromycin is effective against human campylobacteriosis caused by beef consumption. Monitoring the prevalence and antimicrobial resistance of Campylobacter spp. in beef cattle could be useful for managing the risk of human campylobacteriosis.