ANTIMICROBIAL RESISTANCE PATTERN OF Escherichia coli ISOLATED FROM PORK MEAT SOLD IN OZORO

Escherichia coli is one of the most studied bacteria in the world. In the context of human and animal ecology, this microorganism participate as both a commensal of the gut, being one of the first bacteria species to colonize it right after birth and one of the most important human and animal pathogens being able to cause intestinal and extra-intestinal infections. Food (meat) that are sold openly on the roadside has a higher chance of being contaminated by coliform bacterial and pathogenic bacteria such as Escherichia coli, Salmonella spp, Staphylococcus aureus, Bacillus cereus clostridium perfringiens and vibrio cholerae. The study “Antimicrobial Resistance Pattern of E. coli Isolated from Pork Meat”, deals with the microorganism E. coli, how to isolate it from the sample (pork meat) and also to know the antimicrobial resistance pattern of the microorganism that is being isolated from the sample which is the pork meat, the health benefits of pork meat and risk of eating or consuming contaminated pork meat. Coliform was determined using a modified method of Maturin and Peeler. Swab samples were dipped into 25ml universal bottles containing 10ml of 1% buffered peptone water 10-fold serial dilutions from 10-1 to 10-5 were performed using 1ml from each dilution. Approximately 100µl of the aliquot were spread plated onto MacConkey agar. The MacConkey agar plates were incubated at 37oC for 24 hours and counted with a colony counter. The coliform count was calculated using the formula. All outcome data were analyzed using Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS version 27.0). The prevalence data for E.coli and coliforms count were determined using independent samples T-Test and One-Way Analysis of Variance (ANOVA). All p-values were based on 2-tailed tests of significance where p<0.05 is considered statistically significant.