REDUCING ANTIMICROBIAL RESISTANCE SPREAD BETWEEN AND WITHIN POULTRY FARMS ACROSS THE FOOD CHAIN

Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is a threat to food safety and to the health of animals and humans. Decreasing the antimicrobial use (AMU) in animals can help mitigate AMR in foodborne pathogens. However, the effect of reducing AMU in poultry on the spread of AMR across the food chain and to the environment of farms is not fully elucidated. Ouroverall goalis to identify the prevalence and potential transmission pathways of AMR across the food chain and its associations with farm practices and AMU. Findings will allow for biosecurity measures to avoid the AMR spread within and between farms, reducing the risk of contamination of carcasses with foodborne pathogens carrying AMR. Thisseedproject will provide information on the AMR prevalence and transmission in poultry farms.Future projectswill build on this seed proposal and will, through extension work, evaluate the effect of improving biosecurity and flock health status in relation to the AMU and AMR at farms. In addition, future work will build on results from this proposal and measure the risk reduction of human contamination with foodborne pathogens carrying AMR due to these measures.Specific objectives:Objective 1:To identify microbial population diversity and prevalence of AMR genes (ARG) in environmental samples from hatchery, broiler, breeder, and pullet farms and from carcasses in processing plants.Objective 2:To identify transmission patterns of ARG between sample types and locations inside and outside the poultry house, between houses, and to the processing plant.Objective 3:To identify the impact of AMU and farm practices on microbiome connections and transmission of ARG.