Antibiotic Resistant Pathogenic Bacteria Isolated from Aquaculture Systems in Bungoma County, Kenya

Aquaculture production in Kenya has been growing exponentially as a Government initiative to meet population nutritional requirements and food security. Unfortunately factors exist such as fish infection and disease that work against the health and survival of fish in aquaculture. This study focused on identifying bacterial pathogens present in aquaculture systems in Bungoma County and determined how the pathogens respond to commonly used antimicrobial agents. During the study, Vibrio vulnificus, Vibrio parahaemolyticus, Aeromonas hydrophila and Pseudomonas aeruginosa were recovered from farmed Nile tilapia while Aeromonas hydrophila and Streptococcus iniae were isolated from fish source pond water and fish feeds respectively. Among the bacterial isolates from Nile tilapia, Vibrio vulnificus and Aeromonas hydrophila were resistant to ampicillin while Vibrio parahaemolyticus and Pseudomonas aeruginosa were resistant to cefuroxime and ampicillin. Aeromonas hydrophila recovered from pond water were found to be resistant to both ampicillin and cefuroxime whereas, Streptococcus iniae isolated from fish feeds were observed to be resistant to ceftazidime, cefepime and nalidixic acid, which is a warning that unless we find alternative antimicrobial agents the aquaculture industry is likely to collapse. When the bacterial isolates were subjected to PCR, all five bacterial pathogens isolated from fish, pond water and fish feeds were found to contain blaTEM gene amplified at 424bp