Conclusion
Our hypothesis that not only free-living predatory animals are involved in the spread of resistance has definitely been confirmed by the results of this research. Thus, the diet, the lifestyle associated with living close to human settlements, and even the potential of using the same food sources (rats) probably have a large impact on the emergence of a high percentage of resistance among strains isolated from herbivores, insectivores, or omnivores. Moreover, the large diversity of the studied isolates and the possibility of carrying more than one MDR strain indicate that the results obtained so far showing free-living animals as reservoirs of drug resistance may be significantly underestimated, which seems to be an alarming phenomenon. Furthermore, these MDR strains are carriers of resistance genes, which are also commonly found in strains from humans, farm animals, and pets.
We must also be aware that although E. coli is mainly a commensal bacterium, some strains can cause infections. Our research indicates that not only farm animals are a common reservoir for the ExPEC, ETEC, and EHEC strains, which is a serious premise for the need to study not only the spread of resistance genes but also virulence-associated genes in E. coli strains isolated from many species of wild animals.
Funding sources : This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.
Ethic statement: The authors confirm that the ethical policies of the journal, as noted on the journal’s author guidelines page, have been adhered to. No ethical approval was required