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61,005 resultsShowing papers similar to Knowledge gaps in the assessment of antimicrobial resistance in surface waters
ClearAntimicrobial Resistance Development Pathways in Surface Waters and Public Health Implications
Researchers evaluated the pathways through which antibiotic-resistant bacteria develop and spread in surface waters, identifying healthcare facilities, wastewater, agricultural runoff, and wildlife as major vehicles. The study found that antibiotic residues, heavy metals, and even climate change drive the emergence of resistance in aquatic environments. The findings highlight that surface water contamination poses a growing public health threat, particularly for food and animal handlers who face higher exposure risk.
Antibiotic and Non-Antibiotic Determinants of Antimicrobial Resistance: Insights from Water Ecosystems
This review explains how non-antibiotic pollutants like heavy metals, biocides, and microplastics are contributing to antibiotic resistance in water systems, beyond the well-known problem of antibiotic overuse. Wastewater treatment plants are hotspots where these pollutants interact with bacteria, promoting the spread of resistance genes through mobile genetic elements. The findings are concerning for human health because drug-resistant bacteria from water environments can ultimately reach people through drinking water and food.
Accumulation of antibiotics in the environment: Have appropriate measures been taken to protect Canadian human and ecological health?
This review examines how antibiotics and other contaminants of emerging concern, including microplastics, are legally discharged into Canadian freshwater from treatment plants and accumulate in the environment. The buildup of these substances raises concerns about antibiotic resistance and ecosystem disruption, with potential downstream effects on human health through contaminated drinking water and food sources.
Antimicrobial Resistance in Exploited Estuaries: Some Overlooked Environmental Contaminants and Microbial Niches Might Act as Drivers
This review examined antimicrobial resistance in exploited estuaries, identifying overlooked environmental contaminants including antibiotics, heavy metals, and biocides as drivers of resistance gene spread in estuarine microbiomes with implications for human health and food safety.
On the Generation, Impact and Removal of Antibiotic Resistance in the Water Environment
This review explains how antibiotic resistance develops and spreads through water environments — including rivers, groundwater, and wastewater. The findings are relevant to microplastics because plastic particles in water are known to accumulate antibiotic-resistant bacteria, potentially accelerating the spread of drug resistance through aquatic systems.
An approach for deriving water quality guideline values for antimicrobials that integrates ecotoxicity and antimicrobial resistance endpoints
Researchers developed an approach for setting water quality guideline values for antimicrobials in Australia and New Zealand that integrates both direct ecotoxicity endpoints and antimicrobial resistance endpoints, addressing a gap in current frameworks that do not account for resistance-promoting environmental concentrations.
The problem of contamination of aquatic ecosystems with antibiotics (a review)
This review examines the contamination of aquatic ecosystems by antibiotics, synthesizing global data on risks associated with antibiotic presence in ocean and freshwater environments, including effects on aquatic organisms and the promotion of antibiotic resistance. The authors assess quantitative and qualitative contamination using bivalves as bioindicators and evaluate the spread of resistance genes through aquatic biocenoses.
Occurrence of toxic metals and their selective pressure for antibiotic-resistant clinically relevant bacteria and antibiotic-resistant genes in river receiving systems under tropical conditions
Researchers sampled rivers in the Democratic Republic of Congo receiving hospital wastewater and found high levels of heavy metals, antibiotic-resistant bacteria, and antibiotic-resistance genes in sediments, with several toxic metals strongly correlated with the persistence of drug-resistant microbes — highlighting the need for better urban wastewater management in tropical developing countries.
Water and sanitation: an essential battlefront in the war on antimicrobial resistance
This review examines the role of water and sanitation infrastructure in combating antimicrobial resistance, identifying wastewater and contaminated water as key transmission routes for resistant bacteria and resistance genes. While focused on AMR broadly, the study notes that microplastics in water systems can serve as substrates for biofilm formation and may facilitate the spread of antimicrobial resistance in aquatic environments.
The interplay between antimicrobial resistance, heavy metal pollution, and the role of microplastics
This review explores the three-way connection between microplastics, heavy metals, and antibiotic resistance in the environment. Microplastics serve as surfaces where bacteria form biofilms and exchange resistance genes, while heavy metals have been driving bacterial resistance for billions of years through similar genetic mechanisms. Together, these pollutants create hotspots where dangerous antibiotic-resistant bacteria can develop and spread.
Impact of wastewater treatment plant effluent discharge on the antibiotic resistome in downstream aquatic environments: a mini review
This review summarizes how wastewater treatment plants release antibiotic-resistant bacteria and resistance genes into rivers and lakes through their treated water. Current treatment processes cannot fully remove these resistance factors, allowing them to spread in downstream water bodies and potentially reach humans through drinking water and the food chain. The review is relevant to microplastics research because microplastics in wastewater can serve as surfaces where resistant bacteria grow and spread.
Antibiotic resistance fate in the full-scale drinking water and municipal wastewater treatment processes: A review
This review examines how antibiotic-resistant bacteria and resistance genes move through drinking water and wastewater treatment processes, finding that conventional treatment does not fully eliminate resistance. Microplastics in water systems act as surfaces that harbor and potentially transfer antibiotic resistance genes, making microplastic removal from water treatment an important co-benefit for antibiotic resistance management.
Microplastics in fresh- and wastewater are potential contributors to antibiotic resistance - A minireview
Researchers reviewed the link between microplastic pollution and the spread of antibiotic resistance in freshwater environments, finding that microplastic surfaces host unique bacterial communities enriched in antibiotic-resistant bacteria and the resistance genes they can share with other microbes. The close packing of bacteria in these plastic-surface biofilms may accelerate the spread of drug-resistant pathogens through drinking water sources, though the full health implications remain poorly understood.
Antibiotic resistant bacteria colonising microplastics in the aquatic environment: An emerging challenge
Researchers reviewed how microplastics in aquatic environments act as surfaces where antibiotic-resistant bacteria can grow and swap resistance genes with each other, raising concern that contaminated seafood and water could transfer these hard-to-treat bacteria to humans.
Proclivities for prevalence and treatment of antibiotics in the ambient water: a review
This review critically examines the prevalence of antibiotics in ambient water systems and the challenges of treating antibiotic-contaminated water. Researchers found that antibiotic resistance in water environments has emerged as a major public health concern, driven by pharmaceutical runoff and inadequate wastewater treatment. The study evaluates various treatment technologies and emphasizes the need for better monitoring and removal strategies to address this growing threat to water quality.
The nexus of microplastics, food and antimicrobial resistance in the context of aquatic environment: Interdisciplinary linkages of pathways
This review examines how microplastics in aquatic environments serve as surfaces where bacteria can grow, share antibiotic resistance genes, and then enter the food chain through contaminated seafood. The combination of microplastic pollution and antimicrobial resistance creates a compounding threat, as resistant bacteria riding on plastic particles can survive water treatment and reach humans. The authors call for interdisciplinary research connecting environmental science and public health to address this growing risk.
Do microplastics promote the attachment of antimicrobial resistant pathogens?
Researchers examined whether microplastics promote the attachment and persistence of antimicrobial resistant (AMR) pathogens, finding that microplastics in aquatic environments frequently co-occur with AMR bacteria and antimicrobial residues, and may facilitate the spread of resistant pathogens.
Pharmaceuticals in Water: Risks to Aquatic Life and Remediation Strategies
This review examines how pharmaceutical drugs in waterways threaten aquatic life and potentially human health. The biggest concern is the rise of antibiotic resistance from drugs entering water through household and agricultural waste. While not specifically about microplastics, the topic is connected because microplastics can adsorb and transport pharmaceutical residues through water systems.
A Mini-Review of Antibiotic Resistance Drivers in Urban Wastewater Treatment Plants: Environmental Concentrations, Mechanism and Perspectives
This review examines the drivers of antibiotic resistance in urban wastewater treatment plants, including antibiotics, heavy metals, disinfectants, personal care products, and microplastics. Researchers summarized the concentration levels and mechanisms by which these chemical pollutants promote the development and spread of antibiotic-resistant bacteria and genes. The study emphasizes the importance of studying these interactions under realistic conditions to better understand and mitigate antibiotic resistance in wastewater systems.
Factors promoting and limiting antimicrobial resistance in the environment – Existing knowledge gaps
This review highlights overlooked factors in antimicrobial resistance dissemination, emphasizing knowledge gaps that must be addressed to create a comprehensive understanding of resistance spread within the One Health framework.
Comparative selective pressure potential of antibiotics in the environment
Researchers developed a life-cycle-based framework to compare the antibiotic resistance selection pressure potential of various antibiotics in the environment, finding that measured environmental concentrations of certain antibiotics exceed predicted thresholds for resistance selection.
Quantifying health risks of plastisphere antibiotic resistome and deciphering driving mechanisms in an urbanizing watershed
This study measured the health risks posed by antibiotic resistance genes found on microplastic surfaces in a watershed affected by urbanization. Polyethylene microplastics carried the highest risk, and urban development increased the danger by promoting the spread of resistance genes among bacteria living on plastic surfaces. The findings show that microplastics in waterways act as vehicles for antibiotic resistance, which could make infections harder to treat in communities downstream.
Biofilm formation on microplastics and interactions with antibiotics, antibiotic resistance genes and pathogens in aquatic environment
This review explains how microplastics in waterways develop bacterial biofilms on their surfaces that can harbor antibiotic-resistant bacteria and help spread antibiotic resistance genes to new environments. This is concerning for human health because these resistant microbes could eventually reach people through drinking water or seafood consumption.
Evaluating the role of microplastics and wastewater in shaping Vibrio spp. and antibiotic resistance gene abundance in urban freshwaters
Researchers sampled water and microplastic biofilms from urban South African rivers and found that microplastics disproportionately enriched Vibrio spp. and tetracycline resistance genes relative to the surrounding water, suggesting microplastics selectively concentrate pathogens and antibiotic resistance genes.