Study on Campylobacter jejuni: Isolation of the Campylobacter from Chicken feces and their Survival Period in Chicken Mince

In the recent years, cases of Campylobacter enteritis were reported and animal-derived Campylobacter as an important infectious source was focused. Eighty-seven strains of Campylobacter were isolated from 132 feces among chickens carried to the Saga city Butchery in 1980-1981. From the biological characteristics, these 87 strains isolated were identified to Campylobacter jejuni biological type I, calssified by Skirrow and Benjamin. Also they were biologically perfectly the same as those of 19 among the 20 strains of Campylobacter isolated from feces of enteritis patients in Saga city in 1981.Drug-sensitivities also revealed similarities between strains isolated from chicken and human feces; high sensitivity to CP, KM, GM, MNC, JM and EM, and fair sensitivity to TC and NA. Many strains, however, were showed to be resistant to Pc-G and CER, and resistance for all strains to CET was observed.The 37 of the 87 strains isolated from chicken feces and the 13 of the 20 strains isolated from human feces were examined serologically by the Tokyo Metropolitan Research Laboratory of Public Health. Among the 37 strains isolated from chicken feces 33 were serologically classified into 8 serotypes, i. e., TCK 3, 5, 7, 8, 13, 20, 22 and 24, and the remaining 4 were unable to be classified. Among the 13 strains isolated from human feces 7 were classified into 4 serotypes, i. e., TCK 7, 19, 24 and 26, and the remaining 6 were unable to be classified. Thereby, the common serotypes found in strains isolated from chicken and human feces were TCK 7 and 24.The survival period of these strains in chicken mince were examined at temperatures of 42, 25, 5 and-25°C. At 42°C and 25°C complete extinction was observed within 1-2 days. However, the longest survival at 5°C was 19 days and a survival of longer than 3-4 month was observed at-25°C.