Background: Campylobacter species is a zoonotic pathogen and one of the most common causes of bacterial foodborne
illnesses.
Objective: To investigate the surveillance and differences in antibiotic drug resistance, in addition to tetracycline
resistance genes and virulence factors in C. jejuni isolated from both some poultry species and humans.
Materials and Methods: A total of 600 samples were collected from poultry species and humans, investigated by
bacteriological and biochemical methods, C.jejuni were confirmed by mapA gene using PCR. Antibiotic resistance was
assessed and 108 C.jejuni strains were tested for detection of tetO and tetA, and 6 virulence genes; flaA, virB11, cdt,
cdtA, cdtB, and cdtC.
Results: Our results revealed that the occurrence of C. jejuni was 23.67%, identified as 20.21 and 37.5 % in the
examined poultry and human samples, respectively. The evaluation of phenotypic resistance revealed that C.jejuni
isolates had high resistance rates to ampicillin, erythromycin, cloxacillin, amoxicillin, azithromycin, and tetracycline
81.69, 79.58, 77.46, 76.76, 76.06 and76.06%, respectively. The results of the molecular technique detected that
antimicrobial resistance genes in C. jejuni were tetO and tetA 27.78 and 100%, respectively. All isolates of C.jejuni in
poultry and humans possessed virulence genes involved in cytotoxin production (cdt, cdtA, cdtB, and cdtC). The genes
involved in invasion (virB11) and Motility, adherence colonization (flaA) were also widely dispersed between humans
and poultry with the following percentages of 74.07 and 64.81% for virB11 and flaA, respectively.
Conclusion: This study provided an overview of antimicrobial resistance, the presence of tetracycline resistance, and
virulence genes of C.jejuni isolates in poultry and human, which highlights the possible risk to consumer health in Egypt.