ANIMAL TESTING

 

Bats’ amazing plan B for when they can’t hear

New research reveals instant compensation strategy that other animals might share

Peer-Reviewed Publication

Johns Hopkins University

 

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When bats can’t hear, new research finds that these hearing-dependent animals employ a remarkable compensation strategy. Compare how a bat with normal hearing and a bat that temporarily cannot hear fly from a platform, down a corridor and through a window to claim a treat.

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Credit: Johns Hopkins University

When bats can’t hear, new research finds that these hearing-dependent animals employ a remarkable compensation strategy.

They adapt immediately and robustly, suggesting for the first time that bats’ brains are hard-wired with an ability to launch a Plan B in times of diminished hearing.

The Johns Hopkins University work, newly published in Current Biology, raises questions about whether other animals and even humans might be capable of such deft accommodations.

“Bats have this amazing flexible adaptive behavior that they can employ anytime,” said senior author Cynthia F. Moss, a Johns Hopkins neuroscientist who studies bats. “Other mammals and humans also have these adaptive circuits that they can use to help make decisions and navigate their environment but what’s striking here is that it’s very fast, almost automatic.”

All animals adapt in various ways as a response to sensory deprivation. People at a loud bar, might lean in to better hear what someone is saying. A dog might tilt its head toward a muted sound.

Here researchers wondered how hearing-dependent echolocating bats might adapt when a key auditory region in the brain was turned off.

They trained bats to fly from a platform, down a corridor, and through a window to get a treat. Researchers then had the same bats repeat the task but with a critical auditory pathway in the midbrain temporarily blocked. Disabling this brain region isn’t like plugging your ears; it’s preventing most auditory signals from reaching the deep brain. The drug-induced technique is reversible and lasts about 90 minutes.

With their hearing blocked, bats were able to navigate the course surprisingly well, even on the first try. They weren’t as agile and ran into things, but every tested bat compensated immediately and effectively.

“They struggled but managed,” Moss said.

The bats changed their flight path and vocalizations. They flew lower, oriented themselves along walls and increased both the number and length of their calls, which boosted the power of echo signals they use for navigation.

“Echolocation acts like strobes, so they were basically taking more snapshots to help them get the missing information,” said co-author Clarice A. Diebold, a former Johns Hopkins graduate student who is now a postdoctoral student at Washington University in St. Louis. “We also found that they broadened the bandwidth on these calls. These adaptations are very interesting because we’d usually see them when bats are compensating for external noise but this is an internal processing deficit.”

Although the team repeated the experiments, the compensation skills of the bats didn’t improve over time. This means the adaptation behaviors the bats employed weren’t learned; they were innate, latent and hard-wired into the bats’ brain circuitry.

“It highlights how robust the brain is to manipulation and external noise,” said co-author Jennifer Lawlor, a postdoctoral fellow at Johns Hopkins.

The team was surprised that the bats could hear at all with this region of their brain disabled. They believe bats either relied on a previously unknown auditory pathway or that unaffected neurons might support hearing in previously unknown ways.

“You’d think an animal wouldn’t be able to hear at all,” Moss said. “But it suggests that there might be multiple pathways for sound to travel to the auditory cortex.”

The team would next like to determine to what degree the findings apply to other animals and humans.

“Can this work tell us something about auditory processing and adaptive responses in humans? Moss said. “Since no one has done this, we don’t know. The findings raise important questions that will be exciting to pursue in other research models.”

Authors include Kathryne Allen, Grace Capshaw, Megan G. Humphrey, Diego Cintron-De Leon and Kishore V. Kuchibhotla, all of Johns Hopkins.

 the portion of the bat's brain that was temporarily silenced during the experiment.

Credit

Johns Hopkins University

Journal

Current Biology

DOI

10.1016/j.cub.2024.10.045 

Protein in soy may reduce the risk of heart failure by affecting gut bacteria

Nagoya University

 

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Soy protein β-conglycinin increases the production of short-chain fatty acids by intestinal bacteria, which slows the progression of heart failure.

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Credit: Reiko Matsushita

A research team from the Nagoya University Graduate School of Medicine has discovered a promising way to slow the progression of heart failure in mice. They fed mice a diet rich in the soybean protein, β-conglycinin (β-CG), which can support heart health by influencing gut bacteria. Their analysis revealed that the soybean protein rich diet increased the production of the short-chain fatty acids (SCFAs) in the intestine that play a role in protecting the heart. Their findings were published in Clinical Nutrition.  

 

Many people with heart problems try to eat a nutritious diet to reduce their risk of disease. As part of a healthy diet, soybeans have long been recognized for their antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties. Based on this, the researchers suspected that proteins in soy may help prevent heart damage. 

 

Dr. Nozomi Furukawa and colleagues fed the soy-derived protein β-CG to mice prone to heart failure and investigated its effects on the heart. The mice showed improved heart function, less muscle thickening, and reduced scarring of the heart tissue, common problems associated with the progression of heart disease.  

 

Analysis of bacteria in the gut identified an increase in three types of SCFA-producing bacteria (Butyricimonas, Marvinbryantia, and Anaerotruncus) as well as concentrations of SCFAs that maintain gut health (acetic acid, butyric acid, and propionic acid).). 

 

These findings suggest that β-CG helps prevent heart damage, at least in part, by promoting the growth of SCFA-producing bacteria in the intestine. Bacteria produce SCFAs in the large intestine during the digestion of fiber and other foods. SCFAs are known to have anti-inflammatory properties and to play a role in maintaining intestinal health. However, their findings suggest they may also help protect the heart from damage caused by high blood pressure. 

 

“An important aspect of this study is that functional soy components showed beneficial effects on the heart,” Furukawa said. “Previously, effects on obesity have been shown, but the effects on cardiovascular disease were not known. Importantly, β-CG intake increases major SCFAs and their producing bacteria as a change in the gut microbiota. These SCFAs may inhibit the progression of heart failure.” 

 

When the researchers used antibiotics to reduce the population of these SCFA-producing microbes in mice, the protective effects of β-CG disappeared. This suggested that the gut microbiota is crucial for β-CG’s heart-protective action. To confirm this, they administered sodium propionate, one of the SCFAs, to the mice and found that it had similar effects to feeding the mice β-CG, reinforcing the idea that SCFAs are a key part in reducing heart damage. 

 

Although the researchers performed this study on mice, the findings suggest that similar mechanisms may help treat heart failure in humans. β-CG or its derivatives could potentially be developed into therapeutic agents that help prevent or slow the progression of heart failure, offering a more natural solution to a major health problem. 

 

“Of course, soy and its components, such as β-CG, may not be effective for all people, especially those with allergies,” Furukawa explained. “In the future, our team will focus on the structure within β-CG and investigate the detailed molecular mechanism of the increase in short-chain fatty acids that show cardioprotective effects, with the aim of developing new treatment and prevention methods.” 

 

The researchers hope that it leads to new ways to treat heart disease through diet and gut health, highlighting the connection between what we eat and how our bodies, particularly our hearts, respond. With heart failure being one of the leading causes of death worldwide, these findings could have a lasting impact on how we maintain a healthy heart. 

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Journal

Clinical Nutrition

DOI

10.1016/j.clnu.2024.09.045 

 

Political opinions influence our choice of chocolate

Linköping University

 

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Arvid Erlandsson, senior associate professor at the Department of Behavioural Sciences and Learning at Linköping University, Sweden.

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Credit: Jonas Roslund

We distance ourselves from completely neutral products if they are liked by people who have political views that we find disagreeable. This is shown in four studies from Linköping University, Sweden. The behaviour is reinforced if we have to make a decision when others are watching.

Political distancing affects us more deeply than was previously known and governs our choices even when it is completely irrelevant. The studies show that even chocolate can be political.

“From a social perspective, it can unfortunately be rational to distance ourselves from these neutral things, but this contributes to a more polarised society,” says Arvid Erlandsson, senior associate professor at the Department of Behavioural Sciences and Learning at Linköping University.

In four studies, researchers investigated people’s attitudes to completely non-political products before and after these were linked to people or groups with different political views. As far as is known, this is the first time such an investigation has been conducted. The results have been presented in the journal Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin.

The first study concerned clothing. The more than 600 participants were first shown a number of pictures of people wearing formal clothes. The heads of the people were hidden. Participants were asked to give their opinion on the design, fit and colour of the clothes and how much they would want to buy them. They were also asked their views on political parties. They then had to re-evaluate the clothes, but this time the faces of the people wearing them were visible. It turned out that the faces belonged to well-known Swedish politicians.

This clearly affected the results in the second round. Clothes worn by a politician from the participants’ least liked party were now more often perceived as less stylish than in the first assessment.

In the next study, more than 800 participants first gave scores to eight well-known chocolate brands and stated their political stance. They were then divided into groups for a second round. One group was told that a previous pilot study showed that their political opponents liked a particular chocolate the best. A second group was instead told which kind their own side preferred. They then made a new assessment.

It turned out that chocolate that was liked by political opponents had now become significantly less appealing. However, varieties that were liked by their own side did not become more popular.

“It’s less about you associating with what your own side likes and more about avoiding what’s liked by the opposing side,” summarises Arvid Erlandsson.

A third study similarly examined willingness to donate money to various charities. More than 1,200 people participated and the results were the same as in the previous studies. Participants were less likely to give money to organisations they were told were preferred by political opponents.

The researchers think that we unconsciously behave this way to maintain a consistent self-image. What the participants did not know was that the pilot study showed that everyone – regardless of their political affiliation – had actually liked the same chocolate varieties and the same charities.

In the last study, 1,295 people participated. They also had to choose between products, but with a difference. One group made their choices while being observed by animated faces they were told belonged to their own political grouping. It turned out that the tendency to distance oneself from products liked by political opponents was further reinforced. The researchers’ conclusion is that we attach great importance to how we appear to others.

“Knowing about it might make you think twice, instead of just going on a gut feeling,” says Arvid Erlandsson.

 

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Journal

Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin

DOI

10.1177/01461672241298390 

Method of Research

Survey

Subject of Research

People

Article Title

Politically contaminated clothes, chocolates, and charities: Distancing from neutral products liked by outgroup or ingroup partisans

 

Impact of climate change on water resources will increase price tag to decarbonize the grid

University of California - San Diego

A new study warns that current plans to achieve zero emissions on the grid by 2050 vastly underestimate the required investments in generation and transmission infrastructure. The reason: these plans do not account for climate change’s impacts on water resources.

Specifically, changes in water availability caused by climate change could decrease hydropower generation by up to 23% by the year 2050, while electricity demand could increase by 2%. Both these phenomena would come together in summer to compound impacts on the grid.

To adapt to these impacts, the Western United States would need to build up to 139 gigawatts of power capacity between 2030 and 2050–equivalent to nearly three times California’s peak power demand, or up to 13 gigawatts in transmission capacity during the same time period. The total additional investment would come with a price tag of up to $150 billion. 

That is the conclusion of a study published Nov. 25 in Nature Communications (Szinai et al., 2024) and co-authored by a team of Canadian and U.S. researchers, including at the University of California San Diego. 

In this study, researchers took into account the vulnerability of the Western United States to water-related climate change impacts, such as rising temperatures, changing patterns in rainfall and declining snowpack. They built simulations that link the region’s water and electricity systems. They then evaluated how the region could adapt to a range of potential climate change futures from 2030 to 2050, while still trying to transition to a grid powered by carbon-free energy sources. 

“Our results suggest that if [the West] ignores climate change impacts and associated water sector dynamics in planning, the grid will have insufficient resources to maintain system reliability and meet decarbonization goals,” the researchers write. 

Loss of hydropower no matter the scenario

Under the models researchers used, the Pacific Northwest would experience some increases in rainfall, while the Southwest would continue to experience drying and droughts. As a result, key water basins in the region, such as the Colorado River, would keep shrinking. 

Hydropower, which constitutes 20% of average energy generation in the West, will decline in response to these conditions. The models indicate that a mix of renewable power sources, such as wind and solar, will be necessary to offset these hydropower shortfalls. In climate scenarios with lower hydropower shortfalls and lower increases in energy consumption, wind power would mostly fill the gap. In scenarios with greater shortfalls, solar power would play a large role in filling the gap, complemented by flexible battery storage and geothermal power. 

Meanwhile, increased need for cooling buildings would drive up electricity demand, which would be especially high in the Southwest–California, Nevada, Arizona and New Mexico. In the Pacific Northwest–Oregon and Washington–decreased electricity use for heating could partially offset increased electricity use for cooling. The electricity demand related to water consumption is expected to increase in the Mountain region–Colorado, Montana, Wyoming, Idaho and Utah. Agricultural water needs, and associated electricity use for groundwater pumping, would also keep increasing in California’s Central Valley. 

“Without explicitly quantifying how climate change and water interdependencies may together affect future electricity supply and demand, grid planners may significantly underestimate the magnitude and type of resources needed to achieve decarbonization goals and maintain grid reliability,” the researchers write. 

Next steps

Next steps in the research would include evaluating how programs that seek to make demand more flexible and responsive could offset shortfalls in supply. Also, researchers would like to explore the role of transitions in the electricity sector, such as widespread electrification of buildings and transportation systems, and their synergies with the operation of the grid. More study is needed to understand how extended and more intense droughts would impact water and electricity systems in the West. 

“Finally, we need to understand and overcome the significant political barriers to transmission expansion across the West, which may make capacity additions difficult to achieve in practice,” the researchers write. 

The study was supported by the U.S. Department of Energy. 

Climate change and its influence on water systems increases the cost of electricity system decarbonization

Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory: corresponding author Julia Szinai; Andrew Jones 
National Center for Atmospheric Research: David Yates
National Renewable Energy Laboratory: Pedro Sánchez Pérez,
University of Toronto: Martin Staadecker
University of California, Berkeley: Daniel Kammen
University of California San Diego: Patricia Hidalgo-Gonzalez

 

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Journal

Nature Communications

Method of Research

Computational simulation/modeling

Subject of Research

Not applicable

Article Title

Climate change and its influence on water systems increases the cost of electricity system decarbonization

Article Publication Date

25-Nov-2024

Phages, towards a targeted alternative to antibiotics

Institut Pasteur

 

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Representation of a phage bound to a bacterium.            

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Credit: © Adrien Bernheim

With the rapid development of antibiotics in the 1930s, phage therapy – using viruses known as bacteriophages or phages to tackle bacterial infections – fell into oblivion. But as the current rise in antibiotic resistance is making it increasingly difficult to treat bacterial infections, phage therapy is once again sparking interest among physicians and scientists – although it remains complex in practice because of the great diversity and specificity of phages. Against this backdrop, scientists from the Institut Pasteur, Inserm, the Paris Public Hospital Network (AP-HP) and Université Paris Cité have developed a simple and effective new tool that recommends the best possible phage cocktail for a given patient. They did so by developing and training an artificial intelligence model capable of making a tailored selection of phages based solely on the genome of the targeted bacteria. The results of this research, published on October 31, 2024 in the journal Nature Microbiology, pave the way for personalized phage therapies to treat antibiotic-resistant bacterial infections.

Some bacteria, like Escherichia coli, are becoming increasingly resistant to conventional antibiotics and developing into what are known as "superbugs." To bypass the problem of resistance, which represents a major public health challenge, research teams are exploring the possibilities of phage therapy. The idea is to use viruses known as phages or bacteriophages, which only infect bacteria and specifically eliminate those that are pathogenic for humans. "Phage therapy was invented by the Institut Pasteur scientist Félix d'Hérelle in the 1920s, before being progressively abandoned since the late 1930s following the rise in antibiotics, which were much easier and cheaper to produce and use. Nowadays only a few countries in Eastern Europe, such as Georgia, continue to use phage therapy, while in Western countries, "broad host range" phages are occasionally used under compassionate care to treat chronic multidrug-resistant infections(1) if no other authorized drugs are effective," explains Baptiste Gaborieau, co-first author of the paper, an intensive care specialist at Louis Mourier Hospital (AP-HP) and a scientist in the IAME laboratory (Université Paris Cité-Inserm). "Over the past 20 years, after being promoted by WHO(2) and with clinical trials being launched recently, including in Europe, phage therapy has once again been sparking interest."

One challenge is knowing which phage will be effective in treating a given infection, since each phage can only infect certain bacterial strains.(3) In soil or water, where phages are naturally present, they circulate until they find the right target. Scientists from the Institut Pasteur, Inserm, the Paris Public Hospital Network (AP-HP) and Université Paris-Cité therefore set out to investigate bacteria-phage interactions in more detail to see whether it is possible to predict how effective a phage will be on a given bacterial strain. The first stage was to establish a quality dataset of interactions between 403 diverse Escherichia coli strains and 96 phages. This work took more than two years. "We put phages in contact with bacteria in culture and observed which bacteria were killed. We studied 350,000 interactions and successfully identified the characteristics in the bacterial genome likely to predict phage efficacy," summarizes Aude Bernheim, last author of the study and Head of the Institut Pasteur’s Molecular Diversity of Microbes laboratory. "Contrary to what we initially thought, the ability of phages to infect bacteria, which indicates their efficacy, is determined by receptors at the bacterial surface rather than bacterial anti-viral defense mechanisms," continues Florian Tesson, co-first author of the paper and a PhD student in the Molecular Diversity of Microbes laboratory at the Institut Pasteur and the IAME laboratory at Université Paris Cité-Inserm.

This precise, comprehensive analysis of the interaction mechanisms between bacteria and phages enabled the bioinformaticians in the team to design an optimized, effective artificial intelligence program. The program is based on an analysis of the bacterial genome, especially the regions involved in coding bacterial membrane receptors – the gateway for phages. "We are not dealing with a "black box," and that's what makes our AI model so effective. We know exactly how it works, and that helps us to improve its performance," says Hugo Vaysset, co-first author of the paper and a PhD student in the Institut Pasteur’s Molecular Diversity of Microbes laboratory. After more than two years of development and training, the AI model was able to correctly predict the efficacy of phages in treating the E. coli bacteria in the dataset in 85% of cases, simply by analyzing the bacterial DNA. "This result exceeded our expectations," says Aude Bernheim. To take their research further, the scientists tested the model on a new collection of E. coli bacterial strains responsible for pneumonia and selected a tailored "cocktail" of three phages for each of them. In 90% of cases, the phages specifically chosen by AI were successful and destroyed the bacteria. This method, which can easily be transferred to hospital laboratories, paves the way in the coming years for a strategy whereby a personalized selection of phage treatments can be made rapidly if bacterial infection with highly antibiotic-resistant Escherichia coli is diagnosed. "We still need to test the effect of phages in different environments, but proof of concept has been established. We hope to be able to extend it to other pathogenic bacteria, since our AI model has been designed to adapt easily to other scenarios with the aim of offering personalized phage therapy treatments in future," concludes Aude Bernheim.

1. In France, phages can be used if a temporary authorization for use (ATU) is issued for a named patient
2. https://www.who.int/europe/news/item/25-06-2024-building-evidence-for-the-use-of-bacteriophages-against-antimicrobial-resistance
3. A group of bacteria with the same characteristics within a given species

 

 

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Journal

Nature Microbiology

DOI

10.1038/s41564-024-01832-5 

Method of Research

Experimental study

Subject of Research

Cells

Article Title

Prediction of strain level phage–host interactions across the Escherichia genus using only genomic information

SEE

https://plawiuk.blogspot.com/search?q=PHAGES

 https://plawiuk.blogspot.com/search?q=BIOPHAGES

 https://plawiuk.blogspot.com/search?q=BACTERIOPHAGE

 

Detroit health professionals urge the community to act and address the dangers of antimicrobial resistance

Wayne State University - Office of the Vice President for Research

DETROIT — Wayne State University's Center for Emerging and Infectious Diseases (CEID) is launching its participation in World AMR Awareness Week with an urgent message: the growing threat of antimicrobial resistance requires immediate community action, so it is critical to educate, advocate, and act now.

Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR) occurs when bacteria, viruses, fungi, and parasites no longer respond to antimicrobial agents. Because of drug resistance, antibiotics and other antimicrobial agents become ineffective and infections become difficult or impossible to treat, increasing the risk of spreading various diseases that may lead to severe illness or even death.

"Antimicrobial resistance isn't just a future threat—it's a present crisis affecting our Detroit community right now," said Marcus Zervos, M.D., co-director of CEID. "When common infections become resistant to treatment, routine medical procedures become increasingly dangerous. We're seeing this challenge firsthand in our hospitals." 

World AMR Awareness Week is a global campaign to raise awareness and understanding of AMR and promote best practices to address it. It goes from Monday, Nov. 18 to Sunday, Nov. 24. CEID will lead initiatives highlighting this year's theme, “Educate, Advocate, Act Now.”

CEID officials say that Detroit has become an important community in the observation and response to AMR, with several new types of resistant microorganisms first being observed in the southeast Michigan area.

"In Detroit's healthcare facilities, we're encountering more cases where standard antibiotics are failing,” said Teena Chopra, M.D., M.P.H., an infectious diseases expert and co-director at CEID. “This puts our most vulnerable populations at heightened risk."

Increased use and misuse of antimicrobials across sectors and other microbial stressors, such as pollution, create favorable conditions for microorganisms to develop resistance. Bacteria in water, soil and air, for example, can become resistant to common antibiotics following contact with resistant microorganisms. Human exposure to AMR in the environment can occur through contact with polluted waters, contaminated food, inhalation of fungal spores, and other pathways that contain antimicrobial resistant microorganisms.

Health experts have several suggestions to help prevent AMR: Only use antibiotics when prescribed by healthcare professionals, complete the full course of prescribed antibiotics, practice regular hand hygiene, keep vaccinations up to date, properly dispose of unused medications, and learn about infection prevention. CEID experts want the public to understand that antibiotics are not just another medication; they're a precious resource that must be protected through informed usage.

"The public needs to be aware of the potential presence of drug-resistant bacteria in our food supply," said Paul Kilgore, M.D., M.P.H., F.A.C.P, a professor and director of research for the Department of Pharmacy Practice in Wayne State University and co-director of CEID. "As antimicrobial resistance increases globally, some bacteria are becoming resistant to multiple antibiotics, creating dangerous 'superbugs' that pose significant risks to public health. It is important that people adopt responsible practices in their daily lives for using antibiotics and other antimicrobial agents. Important steps include using antibiotics only when prescribed, avoid sharing antibiotics or using them for non-infectious conditions, vaccinate to prevent disease, use good hygiene by washing your hands regularly, practice safe food handling, and educate others about the importance of using antibiotics responsibly and the risks of antimicrobial resistance.”

# # #

About Wayne State University

Wayne State University is one of the nation’s pre-eminent public research universities in an urban setting. Through its multidisciplinary approach to research and education, and its ongoing collaboration with government, industry and other institutions, the university seeks to enhance economic growth and improve the quality of life in the city of Detroit, state of Michigan and throughout the world. For more information about research at Wayne State University, visit research.wayne.edu.

Wayne State University’s research efforts are dedicated to a prosperity agenda that betters the lives of our students, supports our faculty in pushing the boundaries of knowledge and innovation further, and strengthens the bonds that interconnect Wayne State and our community. To learn more about Wayne State University’s prosperity agenda, visit president.wayne.edu/prosperity-agenda.

 

Genomic surveillance studies reveal circulation of multidrug-resistant Enterobacterales in Europe

Two studies indicate warning signs about spread of bacteria resistant to the same group of antibiotics (carbapenems) in both healthcare and community settings across Europe.

European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC)

 

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Phylogenetic tree of Escherichia coli ST131 isolates, including its single locus variants included in the genomic relatedness
analysis, EU/EEA and outside, 2005–2024 (n = 691).       

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Credit: Eurosurveillance journal

Patients seeking treatment in hospital or other healthcare facilities can be particularly vulnerable for infections they acquire during their stay, especially if the infections are difficult to treat because they are resistant to commonly used drugs. For example, Carbapenem-resistant Enterobacterales (CRE) are known to particularly affect hospitalised patients. [1]

Two studies published in Eurosurveillance marking World AMR Awareness Week from 18 to 22 November 2024, analysed new data on spread of such CRE, namely Escherichia coli sequence type (ST)131 producing various carbapenemases and New Delhi metallo-beta-lactamase-1 (NDM-1)-producing Providencia stuartii to inform potential public health action.

Escherichia coli lineage with emerging resistance pattern spreads in the community

In a rapid communication, Kohlenberg et al. assessed genomic and epidemiological data from 17 EU/EEA countries and observed an emergence of Escherichia coli that produces carbapenemases.

Worldwide, E. coli is the pathogen associated with most deaths attributable to antimicrobial resistance [2] and the specific type of E. coli that the authors investigated in their study (ST 131) has been detected across the world and is frequently associated with multidrug-resistance.

Kohlenberg et al. analysed the sequencing and epidemiological data of almost 600 E. coli ST131 isolates provided by national reference laboratories from Austria, Belgium, Czechia, Denmark, Finland, France, Hungary, Ireland, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Slovenia and Sweden. [3]

Detection of E. coli ST131 isolates producing carbapenemases increased over time. One group of isolates stood out for potential association with urinary tract infections in the community inferred from the relatively low median age of patients (57 years), a high proportion of female patients and the frequent detection of isolates from urine samples. The authors note that “community-acquired urinary tract infections might only represent the tip of the iceberg in terms of patient colonisation in the community”.

While Kohlenberg et al. acknowledge they did not analyse a random population of E. coli ST131 but pre-selected isolates from the reference laboratories which probably resulted in an isolate collection with a higher likelihood for co-carriage of other resistance markers, they argue that the results of their study across 17 EU/EEA countries “sends another warning about the worsening epidemiological carbapenemase-producing Enterobacterales situation in the EU/EEA. Further spread of E. coli carrying carbapenemase genes would mean that carbapenems could no longer be consistently effective for empiric treatment of severe E. coli infections.”

Sustained transmission of carbapenem-resistant Providencia stuartii in the healthcare system
One type of CRE which has been very rare in Europe thus far – New Delhi metallo-beta-lactamase-1 (NDM-1)-producing Providencia stuartii – has now been detected in several hospitals in Romania.

In their genomic investigation, Linkevicius et al. [4] looked at how NDM-1-producing P. stuartii is spreading in hospitals with the aim to generate timely information to control any further transmission.

In their study, the authors analysed 74 P. stuartii samples they received from six hospitals across Romania. Most (n=72/74) of the retrieved isolates were related to a reported infection among patients, such as lower respiratory tract bloodstream or urinary tract infections. The authors categorised the majority of the infections as healthcare-associated, i.e. the patients acquired them in a hospital or other healthcare setting. [3]

Given their resistance to several antibiotic classes like penicillins, cephalosporins and carbapenems, 90% of the tested isolates in this study were categorised as multidrug-resistant. In their investigation, Linkevicius et al. identified four multi-hospital clusters of such resistant isolates detected over a year. This indicates sustained transmission within the Romanian healthcare system over a longer period.

Putting their study results into international context by comparing with data from other countries, the authors could also connect the specific lineage of P. stuartii detected in Romania to isolates found in other countries, i.e. Bulgaria, France, Germany, Ireland, the Netherlands, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and the United States of America.

They conclude that “sustained transmission in hospitals in Romania and the international spread point to high risk of further transmission of NDM-1-producing P. stuartii in healthcare settings. Enhanced infection prevention and control measures should be put in place as soon as cases are detected in healthcare facilities.”

 

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References/notes to editors:
[1] Enterobacterales are a group of bacteria (germs) that are a normal part of the human and animal gut but can also cause infections. Carbapenem-resistant Enterobacterales (CRE) are germs resistant to one or several antibiotics called carbapenems. See: https://www.cdc.gov/cre/about/index.html

[2] Kohlenberg Anke, Svartström Olov, Apfalter Petra, Hartl Rainer, Bogaerts Pierre, Huang Te-Din, Chudejova Katerina, Malisova Lucia, Eisfeld Jessica, Sandfort Mirco, Hammerum Anette M, Roer Louise, Räisänen Kati, Dortet Laurent, Bonnin Rémy A, Tóth Ákos, Tóth Kinga, Clarke Christina, Cormican Martin, Griškevičius Algirdas, Khonyongwa Kirstin, Meo Marie, Niedre-Otomere Baiba, Vangravs Reinis, Hendrickx Antoni PA, Notermans Daan W, Samuelsen Ørjan, Caniça Manuela, Manageiro Vera, Müller Vilhelm, Mäkitalo Barbro, Kramar Urška, Pirs Mateja, Palm Daniel, Monnet Dominique L, Alm Erik, Linkevicius Marius. Emergence of Escherichia coli ST131 carrying carbapenemase genes, European Union/European Economic Area, August 2012 to May 2024. Euro Surveill. 2024;29(47)
Available from: https://doi.org/10.2807/1560-7917.ES.2024.29.47.2400727

[3] Murray CJL, Ikuta KS, Sharara F, Swetschinski L, Robles Aguilar G, Gray A, et al. Global burden of bacterial antimicrobial resistance in 2019: a systematic analysis. Lancet. 2022;399(10325):629-55. Available from: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(21)02724-0 PMID:35065702

[4] Linkevicius Marius, Witteveen Sandra, Buzea Mariana, Flonta Mirela, Indreas Marina, Nica Maria, Székely Edit, Tălăpan Daniela, Svartström Olov, Alm Erik, Palm Daniel, Monnet Dominique L, Hendrickx Antoni PA, Kohlenberg Anke, Popescu Gabriel Adrian. Genomic surveillance detects interregional spread of New Delhi metallo-beta-lactamase-1-producing Providencia stuartii in hospitals, Romania, December 2021 to September 2023. Euro Surveill. 2024;29(47):pii=2400587. Available from: https://doi.org/10.2807/1560-7917.ES.2024.29.47.2400587

[5] Healthcare-associated infections are infections acquired by patients during their stay in a hospital or another healthcare setting. Although some of these infections can be treated easily, others may more seriously affect a patient’s health, increasing their stay in the hospital and hospital costs, and causing considerable distress to these patients. 

The most frequently reported types of healthcare-associated infections are respiratory tract infections, surgical site infections, urinary tract infections, bloodstream infections and gastro-intestinal infections. See: https://www.ecdc.europa.eu/en/healthcare-associated-infections

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Journal

Eurosurveillance

DOI

10.2807/1560-7917.ES.2024.29.47.2400727 

Method of Research

Data/statistical analysis

Article Title

Emergence of Escherichia coli ST131 carrying carbapenemase genes, European Union/European Economic Area, August 2012 to May 2024

Article Publication Date

21-Nov-2024