Drinking Water from Dug Wells in Rural Ghana — Salmonella Contamination, Environmental Factors, and Genotypes

Denise Myriam Dekker, Ralf Krumkamp, Nimako Sarpong, Hagen Frickmann, Kennedy Gyau Boahen, Michael Frimpong, Renate Asare, Richard Larbi, Ralf Matthias Hagen, Sven Poppert, Wolfgang Rabsch, Florian Marks, Yaw Adu-Sarkodie and Jürgen May
Additional contact information
Denise Myriam Dekker: Research Group Infectious Disease Epidemiology, Bernhard Nocht Institute for Tropical Medicine, Bernhard-Nocht-Straße 74, Hamburg 20359, Germany
Ralf Krumkamp: Research Group Infectious Disease Epidemiology, Bernhard Nocht Institute for Tropical Medicine, Bernhard-Nocht-Straße 74, Hamburg 20359, Germany
Nimako Sarpong: Kumasi Centre for Collaborative Research, Kumasi, Ghana
Hagen Frickmann: Department of Tropical Medicine, German Armed Forces Hospital of Hamburg, Bernhard Nocht Institute for Tropical Medicine, Bernhard-Nocht-Straße 74, Hamburg 20359, Germany
Kennedy Gyau Boahen: Kumasi Centre for Collaborative Research, Kumasi, Ghana
Michael Frimpong: Kumasi Centre for Collaborative Research, Kumasi, Ghana
Renate Asare: Kumasi Centre for Collaborative Research, Kumasi, Ghana
Richard Larbi: Kumasi Centre for Collaborative Research, Kumasi, Ghana
Ralf Matthias Hagen: Department of Tropical Medicine, German Armed Forces Hospital of Hamburg, Bernhard Nocht Institute for Tropical Medicine, Bernhard-Nocht-Straße 74, Hamburg 20359, Germany
Sven Poppert: Justus-Liebig-University Gießen, Rudolf-Buchheimstraße 6, Gießen 35392, Germany
Wolfgang Rabsch: Robert Koch Institute, FG11, National Reference Centre for Salmonella and other Bacterial Enteric Pathogens, Burgstraße 37, Wernigerode 38855, Germany
Florian Marks: International Vaccine Institute, 1 Gwanak-ro, Gwanak-gu, Seoul 151-742, South Korea
Yaw Adu-Sarkodie: Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST), Accra Road, Kumasi, Ghana
Jürgen May: Research Group Infectious Disease Epidemiology, Bernhard Nocht Institute for Tropical Medicine, Bernhard-Nocht-Straße 74, Hamburg 20359, Germany

IJERPH, 2015, vol. 12, issue 4, 1-12

Abstract: Salmonellosis is an important but neglected disease in sub-Saharan Africa. Food or fecal-oral associated transmissions are the primary cause of infections, while the role of waterborne transmission is unclear. Samples were collected from different dug wells in a rural area of Ghana and analyzed for contamination with bacteria, and with Salmonella in particular. In addition, temporal dynamics and riks factors for contamination were investigated in 16 wells. For all Salmonella isolates antibiotic susceptibility testing was performed, serovars were determined and strains from the same well with the same serovar were genotyped. The frequency of well water contamination with Gram-negative rod-shaped bacteria was 99.2% (n = 395). Out of 398 samples, 26 (6.5%) tested positive for Salmonella spp. The serovar distribution was diverse including strains not commonly isolated from clinical samples. Resistance to locally applied antibiotics or resistance to fluoroquinolones was not seen in the Salmonella isolates. The risk of Salmonella contamination was lower in wells surrounded by a frame and higher during the rainy season. The study confirms the overall poor microbiological quality of well water in a resource-poor area of Ghana. Well contamination with Salmonella poses a potential threat of infection, thus highlighting the important role of drinking water safety in infectious disease control.

Keywords: Salmonella; disease transmission; drinking water; dug wells; risk factor (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2015
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

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