Researchers at Kansas State University have found that houseflies in food-handling and serving facilities carry and may have the capacity to transfer antibiotic-resistant and potentially virulent bacteria, according to their study published in the June 2006 issue of the journal Applied and Environmental Microbiology. In the study the digestive tracts of 260 houseflies collected from five fast food restaurants were tested."This study showed that houseflies in food-handling and serving facilities carry antibiotic-resistant and potentially virulent enterococci that have the capacity for horizontal transfer of antibiotic resistance genes to other bacteria," say the researchers.
more at Medical News Today.
2 comments:
Typically, they can't produce a single person who has ever gotten sick from a housefly.
These guys need to get their heads out of the labs and into the real world. Their type banned ducks hanging in New York Chinatown shops.
Mark, I wouldn't discount the possibility so quickly. Food Service facilities often use alot of chlorine bleach or other anti-bacterial cleaning products. It's thought that there may be a tie between their use and the increase of resistent bacteria. The rise of antibiotic resistant bacteria is a *real* problem - doctors are already starting to run out of high powered antibiotic choices to combat them.
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