Detección y epidemiología de Salmonella spp. en aves silvestres de la Península Ibérica

Abstract

Salmonella is one of the most important foodborne pathogens in the European Union. It causes the highest number of outbreaks, and is the second pathogen with the greatest number of cases, only behind Campylobacter. Despite being a commensal bacterium of the intestine of numerous homoeothermic species, it can cause gastrointestinal or even extra-intestinal clinical signs, like reactive arthritis or meningitis. Furthermore, Salmonella resistant strains have already been isolated in both humans and animals to many different antimicrobials. This condition can affect the effectiveness of treatment, aggravating clinical presentations. Currently, antimicrobial resistance represents the greatest challenge for 21st-century medicine, as it causes treatment failure in thousands of cases and a large number of deaths per year. During last years, numerous resistant Salmonella strains to different antimicrobials has been detected from samples obtained from wildlife and environment. The ability of wildlife as an asymptomatic carrier of this bacterium has been demonstrated, which is especially important in the case of birds...