Prevalence of Salmonella spp. isolated from seagulls and pigeons in Barcelona, Spain and its genetic relatedness with Salmonella human clinical isolates.

Abstract

BACKGROUND: A better understanding of Salmonella epidemiology at the human-wildlife interface, emphasizing the importance of One Health strategies in controlling zoonotic disease transmission is needed. This study aimed to investigate the epidemiological relationship between Salmonella spp. isolated from wild-living birds and human patients in Barcelona, Spain. METHODS: The presence of Salmonella spp. was tested in faecal samples of young specimens of Yellow-legged gull (Larus michahellis, n = 129), Audouin's gull (Ichthyaetus audouinii, n = 97), and pigeon (Columba livia, n = 324) specimens. Similarly, 36 isolates of S. enterica serovar Typhimurium were collected from human patients. The isolates were characterised by chromosomal DNA analysis using pulsed-field gel electrophoresis (PFGE) or whole-genome sequencing. RESULTS: All Salmonella isolates recovered from the bird samples were identified as S. enterica serovar Typhimurium with an overall prevalence of 3.1 % (17/550). Twelve isolates were recovered from 129 Yellow-legged gulls (9.3 %), 3 from 97 Audouin's gulls (3.1 %), and 2 from 324 pigeons (0.6 %). In total, 25/36 (69.5 %) human and 9/17 (52.9 %) bird samples were identified as monophasic species. The PFGE strain typing results with XbaI grouped S. Typhimurium monophasic isolates into eight different clusters. Three pairs of strains (one from a human and one from a seagull) were subjected to whole-genome sequencing. All strains belonged to the same sequence type (ST34), and sequencing data confirmed that all strains analysed corresponded to the monophasic variant of S. Typhimurium and that both 13_13995 (Audouin's gull isolate) and 14_28806 (human isolate) strains were different in only 4 SNPs. The following acquired resistance genes were found in sequenced strains: aph(3'')-Ib, aph(6)-Id, bla, sul2 and tet(B). CONCLUSION: Our results indicate that seagulls may act as reservoirs for S. Typhimurium and pose a potential risk of transmission to humans.