Pollution of water resources is one of the most important global environmental and economical concern.
In developing countries, the lack of waste management, both industrial and domestic, is the cause of water quality
deterioration. The present work is concerning the evaluation of different water resources in Egypt, in addition,
evaluation of pollution risk factor by measuring the multiple antibiotic resistance (MAR) index of the bacterial
community of each water resource. Water samples have been collected from seven different water resources;
shallow groundwater at different rural areas, River Nile water at some different sites, agricultural drainage water
(El-Husseiniya drain), sewage contaminated water (Bahr El-Baqr drain), industrial wastewater (Al-khadrawiya
drain), fresh water Lake (Nasser Lake) and brackish water Lake (Qaroun Lake). The chemical and microbiological
features of all water types have been evaluated, the microbial community of each water resource have been
identified by means of biochemical reactions and 16S rDNA sequencing. The integrated MAR index of each
bacterial community has been calculated by sensitivity test, using ten commercially available antibiotics. Water
quality assessment indicated the acceptable quality of groundwater (at few tested sites), Nile River water (at most of
tested sites), El-Husseiniya drain water and Nasser Lake. In contrary, Bahr El-Baqr drain showed high loads of
organic contaminants and pathogenic bacteria, Al-khadrawiya drain showed contamination with some heavy metals
(Al, Fe, Pb and Zn), and Qaroun Lake showed contamination with sulfate, iron and some pathogenic bacteria. The
MAR index for each water resource was 0.13, 0.215, 0.24, 0.52, 0.65, 0.165 and 0.277, respectively. The
contamination of a given water resource with sewage materials increases the resistance of the whole bacterial
community to antibiotics by the function of plasmid exchange characterizing some members of enterobacteriacea
group, which predominate in such cases. In addition, heavy metals contamination increases the virulence of bacterial
community to resist antibiotics, and categorize the water resource as a high risk polluted water. Therefore,
evaluation of water quality and MAR index for different water resources is recommended.