Antibiotic Resistance Pattern in Bacterial Isolates Obtained from Different Water Samples of Delhi Region

A major issue in anti-bacterial therapy is the development of resistance in the otherwise sensitive strains of bacteria. Exposure of bacteria to low doses of an antibiotic naturally selects for the survival of resistant organisms. The spread of these resistant strains of pathogenic bacteria from environment poses problems to treat such infections. In order to understand the ecology and evolution of antibiotic resistance in our immediate environments, the present study was undertaken to isolate, identify the hotspots of antibiotic resistant bacteria and their patterns of antibiotic resistance against a panel of 8 representative antibiotics belonging to different classes. The samples were collected from wastewater treatment plants including inflow (untreated) and outflow (treated), ground water, surface water (Yamuna River and lake) and drinking water from different areas of Delhi. From each water sample, bacterial isolates were analyzed for their antibiotic resistance profile. Among 224 isolates 34 strains were found to be resistant against 3 or more antibiotics (multi drug resistant). The Ampicillin resistance was found in maximum number of isolates and none of the isolates showed resistance to Ofloxacin. A Pseudomonas sp strain was isolated which showed resistance to five out of eight antibiotics tested.