Isolation of Non-Typhoid Salmonella from Humans and Camels with Reference to its Survival in Abattoir Effluents

Non-typhoid Salmonella (NTS) are cosmopolitan bacterial zoonotic agents. The present study was undertaken to determine the occurrence of NTS in human and camels and test the survival of Salmonella enteritidis in abattoir effluents using volume germ carriers technique. A total of 50 human stool samples including 30 diarrheic and 20 non-diarrheic were collected. Moreover, 108 camel samples were collected from 36 slaughtered camels including feces, mesenteric lymph nodes and liver, 36 each. All samples were cultured by the standard methods for NTS and serotyped. Four (8%) Salmonella isolates were obtained from human stool and 6(5.6%) from camel samples. The positive camel samples included 5 feces and one mesentric lymph nodes with the frequencies of 13.9% and 2.8%, respectively. Nevertheless, the liver samples were Salmonella free (N=36). Three replicates of volume germ carriers were inoculated with Salmonella enteritidis at 7 log CFU/ml in final mix. The contents of germ carriers were examined on days 7, 14, 21 and 28 for the detection of Salmonella enteritidis by the most probable number technique. The mean counts of the 3 replicates were 5, 3 and 0.7 log CFU/ml on days 7, 14 and 21, respectively. The mean number of Salmonella was decreased by 2.2 log week*1. On the day 28, all the 3 replicates count were found to be under detection limit (< 0 log CFU/ml). The results indicate that aerobic storage of abattoir effluents could minimize the risk of salmonellosis in the environment under the research condition. It can be concluded that camels could be a potential reservoir for NTS to humans and animals.