In the south of the Netherlands, in recent years, the black rat (Rattus rattus) has emerged as a prominent rodent on livestock farms.

From March to May 2008, a survey on MRSA in rats living on livestock farms in the south of the Netherlands and the north of Belgium was conducted. In total, 40 black rats (R. rattus) and three brown rats (Rattus norvegicus) were collected from 12 farms including five pig farms, five poultry farms, one mixed pig and veal farm and one goat farm.

MRSA ST398 was detected in black rats captured at two of the five pig farms as well as in a black rat living on the mixed pig and veal farm.

From one black rat captured at another pig farm, MRSA ST 97 was isolated.

Considering the behaviour of rats on livestock farms, it is concluded that rats might play a role in the spread and persistence of MRSA on pig farms, conclude van de Giessen and co-authors.

via Holland – Rats are a plague to pig farmers.

via Meat International – Food Safety: MRSA widespread in German pig breeding stocks.

Bacteria have been discovered by researchers at the University and the Institute Laussanne Galli-Valerio, after sampling more than 100 farms. Pathogens have been detected in pigs and two cows that showed symptoms of inflammation of the udders. Also we have found that three people were carrying the bacteria, though they have not shown symptoms.

The strain detected is the ST398, which is resistant to the antibiotic group lactamina-beta, which is widely used in human medicine like penicillin and cephalosporins.

The MRSA was first detected in animals in 1972. We have already detected the presence of MRSA on farms in the U.S., Canada, Germany and Holland.

We don’t add antibiotics to baby food and Cocoa Puffs so that children get fewer ear infections. That’s because we understand that the overuse of antibiotics is already creating “superbugs” resistant to medication.  Yet we continue to allow agribusiness companies to add antibiotics to animal feed so that piglets stay healthy and don’t get ear infections. Seventy percent of all antibiotics in the United States go to healthy livestock, according to a careful study by the Union of Concerned Scientists — and that’s one reason we’re seeing the rise of pathogens that defy antibiotics.

via Op-Ed Columnist – Pathogens in Our Pork – NYTimes.com.

MRSA, (methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus), or antibiotic-resistant staph, can be found anywhere in nature, according to Paul Ebner, a livestock microbiologist. While he said there has been an increase in the number of these infections and that pigs and other animals can be carriers, the vast majority of infections come from skin-to-skin contact with infected humans.

Making assumptions based on limited studies or information is a big jump and there is no proof to link MRSA in humans to pigs and pig operations at this time, said Ching Ching Wu, professor of veterinary pathobiology and head of microbiology in Purdue’s Animal Disease and Diagnostic Laboratory. Wu said there is more scientific evidence to support the spread of MRSA among humans and from humans to animals rather than from animals to humans.

A University of Iowa study mentioned in the Times column was a pilot study that looked at only two farms, and only one of them had the organism. Another Dutch study was also inconclusive, according to the Purdue experts.

via Purdue Experts On Livestock & Antibiotic Resistance – Cattle Network.

We compared the prevalence of human and animal methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) at pig farms in The Netherlands, and related this to individual and farm-level characteristics. More than half of the farms investigated (28/50) had MRSA in pigs or stable dust and about one third (15/50) of person(s) were identified as MRSA carriers. Human carriage was found only on farms with MRSA-positive pigs or dust. MRSA strains in human samples were the same spa-type as found in pigs and all were not typable by pulsed-field gel electrophoresis (NT-MRSA). Multivariate analyses showed that risk factors for human MRSA carriage were: working in pig stables (OR 40, 95% CI 8-209) and the presence of sows and finishing pigs (OR 9, 95% CI 3-30). Veterinary sample collectors sampling the pigs showed transient MRSA carriage only during the day of the farm visit. Working in pig stables with MRSA-positive pigs poses a high risk for acquiring MRSA, increasingly so when contact with live pigs is more intensive or long lasting.

HighWire Press — Medline Abstract.

We investigated the prevalence of Staphylococcus aureus and methicillin-resistant S. aureus (MRSA) in 120 retail meats from 30 grocery stores in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. S. aureus was recovered from 45.6% of pork and 20% of beef, whereas MRSA was isolated from six meats (5 pork and 1 beef). The MRSA isolates were of two strain types (clones), one harboring Panton-Valentine leucocidin and belonging to pulsed-field gel electrophoresis type USA300, and the other one belonging to USA100.

Isolation and Characterization of Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus from Louisiana Retail Meats — Pu et al., 10.1128/AEM.01110-08 — Applied and Environmental Microbiology.

Nevertheless, the FDA and USDA eagerly pointed to a group called the National Antimicrobial Resistance Monitoring System as the protector of humans from bacteria in food.

The coalition of scientists from several federal agencies primarily target salmonella, campylobacter and E. coli.

However, according to USDA’s Goldman, the group does not screen for MRSA.

The National Pork Producers Council said there is no cause for concern.

“There is nothing to worry about; MRSA (in pigs) has not been found this side of the border,” a spokeswoman said. “USDA and CDC have given our pigs a clean bill of health.”

A CDC spokeswoman said that she could find “no indication we made that statement.”

According to congressional investigators, the pork lobbyists have said their industry would oppose any attempt to test all livestock for MRSA, calling the testing “unnecessary to protect public health.”

Some members of Congress are insisting that the government do more to determine MRSA’s threat to the food supply.

Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, warned last week that there is “overwhelming evidence” that the overuse of antibiotics in industrial livestock production is endangering the effectiveness of many of the most crucial antibiotics for humans.

Pigsite: Potentially fatal bacteria found in pigs, farmworkers.

According to Abby Harper, one of Smith’s graduate students, there are indications that the antibiotics routinely used in pig farming – specifically tetracycline – may be the cause of the spread of MRSA. Other researchers have also noted the synchronous rise of CA-MRSA in humans in the 1990s and the simultaneous introduction of antibiotic regimens on pig farms.

The agent (of disease) may not be tetracycline itself, but the fact that pigs regularly treated with it develop an immunity to it, just like humans, and this immunity can then be transferred, along with the bacteria, to the pig’s human caretakers. If so, the routine use of antibiotics in pig farming, coupled with the indiscriminate use of those same antibiotics in human populations, may be a recipe for a pandemic to rival the 1918 Spanish Flu   that swept the world, killing 50 to 100 million people before it disappeared. 

MRSA “SuperBug” in Pigs and a Squelched Cure Using Garlic | celsias°.

A recent survey in Belgium has shown that the bacteria Methilin-resistant Staphylococcus Aureus MRSA has been isolated in 68% of the pig farms. In 37% of the cases, the farmer and his relatives also carried pig MRSA.

This pig MRSA, a variant of the human MRSA, has also been found in several other countries including Austria, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany and Hungary.

Pig Progress | Pig News | MRSA found in many Belgian pig farms.