Contamination of Chicken Meat With Salmonella spp Distributed in Mahabad City, Iran

Background: Foodborne diseases are one of the fundamental problems in the world. Salmonella is one of the most important foodborne bacteria, which is responsible for the prevalence of foodborne diseases in humans. Objective: The aim of this study was to investigate the presence of Salmonella in distributed chicken meat in Mahabad city, Iran. Materials and Methods: In this study, 100 samples of chicken meat were selected from Mahabad city and investigated for the presence of Salmonella. Each sample was cultured in selenite cystine medium and incubated at 37°C for 24 hours. Then the obtained colonies were cultured in MacConkey agar and SalmonellaShigella agar. Finally, biochemical and antibiogram tests were performed on isolated Salmonella samples. Results: Totally, 7 chicken samples (7%) were found to be contaminated with Salmonella. All of the isolated Salmonella samples were identified as Salmonella enteritidis. All of S. enteritidis isolates (100%) showed the highest resistance to erythromycin and ampicillin antibiotics. All of the tested isolates (100%) showed sensitivity to gentamicin. Conclusion: Our study showed high prevalence of Salmonella in distributed chicken meat in Mahabad city. Therefore, the improvement of health conditions in food preparation centers is highly recommended.