Understanding fate and distribution of antimicrobial compounds and antimicrobial resistance genes during wastewater treatment.

Charlotte Head (University of York, UK)

10:20 - 10:30 Wednesday 13 July Morning

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Session overview

Antimicrobial resistance is a global health crisis, rendering pharmaceutical action against infections ineffective, threatening lives worldwide. Antibiotics are not fully metabolised by humans or animals, leading to dispersion within waste streams. The by-products of wastewater treatment (biosolids and final effluent) are considered to be reservoirs for antibiotic compounds and resistance genes. This is important due to the potential release of by-products into the surrounding natural environment, potentially affecting microbial communities. Research aims have been developed to: (a) identify which compounds and related genes are present throughout the stages of wastewater treatment; (b) identify any effects of antibiotic presence on the prevalence of resistance and related genes; and (c) investigate whether the current accepted methods of treatment are doing enough to mitigate the removal of these compounds and genes. Samples were collected from a municipal wastewater treatment plant south of York, England. Microbial DNA was extracted to investigate the presence of a variety of antibiotic resistance genes, resulting in 119/208 being detected. These genes confer resistance to multiple major antibiotic classes including beta-lactams, sulfonamides and tetracyclines. In addition, non-targeted suspect-screening was carried out using high resolution HPLC-MS/MS to tentatively identify >20 antibiotic parent compounds. The initial study into presence/absence depended on samples taken on a single day. This snapshot indicated both persistence of molecules and stable presence of genes throughout all stages of wastewater treatment. Current work is investigating trends during the air-drying process of the biosolids once partitioned from the treatment process.

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