Surveillance and prevalence of antimicrobial resistant bacteria from public settings within urban built environment: Challenges and opportunities for hygiene and infection control.

Rory Cave, Jennifer Cole, Hermine Mkrtchyan

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

Antimicrobial resistant (AMR) bacteria present one of the biggest threats to public health; this must not be forgotten while global attention is focussed on the COVID-19 pandemic. Resistant bacteria have been demonstrated to be transmittable to humans in many different environments, including public settings in urban built environments where high-density human activity can be found, including public transport, sports arenas and schools. However, in comparison to healthcare settings and agriculture, there is very little surveillance of AMR in the built environment outside of healthcare settings and wastewater. In this review, we analyse the existing literature to aid our understanding of what surveillance has been conducted within different public settings and identify what this tells us about the prevalence of AMR. We highlight the challenges that have been reported; and make recommendations for future studies that will help to fill knowledge gaps present in the literature.
Original languageEnglish
Article number106836
Number of pages13
JournalEnvironmental International
Volume157
Early online date31 Aug 2021
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Dec 2021

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