Molecular bases for multidrug resistance in Yersinia pseudotuberculosis

The enteropathogen Yersinia pseudotuberculosis causes gastrointestinal infections in humans. Although this species is usually susceptible to antibiotics active against Gram-negative bacteria, we identified three multidrug resistant (MDR) strains of Y. pseudotuberculosis that were isolated from the environment in Russia and from a patient in France. The resistance traits of the two Russian isolates were transferable at high frequencies (≈2 × 10−1/donor CFU) to Y. pseudotuberculosis. In contrast no transfer of the antibiotic resistances carried by the French strain was observed. Sequencing of the plasmid extracts of the Y. pseudotuberculosis transconjugants for the Russian isolates revealed the presence of conjugative plasmids of the IncN group that carried genes conferring resistance to four to six classes of antibiotics. The French strain harbored a large MDR plasmid of the IncHI2 group that carried resistance genes to six families of antibiotics, and contained a truncated set of transfer genes, accounting for the lack of plasmid transfer. All three Y. pseudotuberculosis plasmids were homologous to MDR plasmids found in various enterobacteria. A phylogenetic analysis showed that the two Russian strain plasmids were closely related to each other and were more distant from the French plasmid. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first molecular characterization of MDR plasmids in Y. pseudotuberculosis. Due to the propensity of this species to acquire exogenous plasmids, the risk of emergence of new MDR Y. pseudotuberculosis isolates should be seriously taken into consideration.