Occurrence of Vibrio and other pathogenic bacteria in Mytilus galloprovincialis (mussels) harvested from Adriatic Sea, Italy

Sixty-two samples of Mytilus gallopravincialis (mussels) harvested from app roved shellfish waters in the Adriatic Sea were examined for the presence o f Vibrio, Salmonella, Campylobacter, and verocytotoxin producing Escherichi a coli. Vibrio spp. were isolated from 48.4% of samples; the species most f requently found were V. alginolyticus (32.2%) and V. vulnificus (17.7%), fo llowed by li cincinnatiensis (3.2%), V. parahaemolyticus (1.6%), V. fluvial is (1.6%) and V. cholerae non-Ol (1.6%). V. parahaemolyticus resulted negat ive to Kanagawa-phenomenon and to PCR amplification of tdh gene. V. cholera e resulted negative to PCR amplification of sto gene. No Salmonella, Campyl obacter; or E. coli verocytotoxin-producing strains were isolated. The resu lts of this study suggest the potential risk of ingesting raw or undercooke d mussels due to the frequent presence of potentially pathogenic Vibrio spe cies. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.