A major forthcoming sanitary issue concerns the apparition and spreading of drug-resistant microorganisms, potentially threatening millions of humans. In low-income countries, polluted urban runoff and open sewage channels are major sources of microbes. These microbes join natural microbial communities in aquatic ecosystems already impacted by various chemicals, including antibiotics. These composite microbial communities must adapt to survive in such hostile conditions, sometimes promoting the selection of antibiotic-resistant microbial strains by gene transfer. The low probability of exchanges between planktonic microorganisms within the water column may be significantly improved if their contact was facilitated by particular meeting places. This could be specifically the case within biofilms that develop on the surface of the myriads of floating macroplastics increasingly polluting urban tropical surface waters. Moreover, as uncultivable bacterial strains could be involved, analyses of the microbial communities in their whole have to be performed. This means that new-omic technologies must be routinely implemented in low- and middle-income countries to detect the appearance of resistance genes in microbial ecosystems, especially when considering the new ‘plastic context.’ We summarize the related current knowledge in this short review paper to anticipate new strategies for monitoring and surveying microbial communities.

White Spot Disease (WSD) caused by the White Spot Syndrome Virus (WSSV) is the most devastating viral disease threatening the shrimp culture industry worldwide, including Madagascar. WDS was first reported on the island in 2012; however, little is known about the circulation of the virus and its genetic diversity. Our study aimed at describing the molecular diversity and the spread of WSSV in the populations of Madagascan crustaceans. Farmed and wild shrimps were collected from various locations in Madagascar from 2012 to 2016 and were tested for WSSV. Amplicons from positive specimens targeting five molecular markers (ORF75, ORF94, ORF125, VR14/15 and VR23/24) were sequenced for genotyping characterizations. Four genotypes were found in Madagascar. The type-I genotype was observed in the south-west of Madagascar in April 2012, causing a disastrous epidemic, then spread to the North-West coast. Type-II strains were detected in October 2012 causing an outbreak in another Penaeus monodon farm. In 2014 and 2015, types II and III were observed in shrimp farms. Finally, in 2016, types II and IV were found in wild species including Fenneropenaeus indicus, Metapenaeus monoceros, Marsupenaeus japonicus and Macrobrachium rosenbergii. Considering the economic importance of the shrimp industry for Madagascar, our study highlights the need to maintain WSSV surveillance to quickly take appropriate countermeasures in case of outbreak and to sustain this industry.

Access to piped water is often limited to urban areas in low-income countries, and the microbiological quality of drinking water varies due to technical and environmental constraints. To analyse the parameters that modulate the contamination of these systems, this study examines 16 years of microbial quality data for water supplied in 32 urban areas of Madagascar. A discriminant statistical approach and agglomerative hierarchical clusters were applied to environmental and climatic data. The microbial contamination varied between sites from 3.3 to 17.5%, and 78% of the supply systems showed large variations between years or months. Agglomerative hierarchical clusters (AHCs) revealed four supply system profiles that share a similar bacteriological evolution. Heavy rainfall and dry periods sustained increasing contamination, as reflected in levels of spores of sulphite-reducing clostridia (SSRC) and/or total coliforms (TC). SSRC were dominant in three profiles, with faecal indicator bacteria (FIB) dominant in the other. Principal component analysis demonstrated the main drivers of contamination: type of water source, implemented treatment, location of the site, population growth, lack of protection, agriculture, urbanization/sanitation, and flooding threats. Contamination increased over the 16-year period, reaching alarming levels. The protection of water sources should be a concern for public authorities.

Certains entéropathogènes majeurs sont associés aux produits carnés, notamment Salmonella spp. ou Escherichia coli pro­ducteur de shigatoxines (3), et ce, en lien avec les conditions d’hygiène rencontrées de l’abattage à l’étal (1). L’objectif a été d’évaluer (a) le niveau des indicateurs d’hygiène comme E. coli, (b) la prévalence de Salmonella spp., de Campylobacter ther­motolérants, de Listeria monocytogenes, d’Yersinia enterocolitica et d’E. coli O157:H7 dans les viandes commercialisées dans la communauté urbaine d’Antananarivo, et (c) la sensibilité aux antibiotiques des isolats.Au total 137 échantillons, incluant de la viande de zébu hachée (n = 52) ou non (n = 48), et de la viande de porc hachée (n = 10) ou non (n = 27) ont été collectés dans les grandes sur­faces (24 p. 100) et sur les marchés d’Antananarivo (76 p. 100) d’avril à novembre 2014. Des méthodes conventionnelles ISO (International Organization for Standardization) et validées (Vidas technologie Biomérieux) ont été mises en oeuvre, ainsi que la confirmation des isolats par spectrométrie de masse (Maldi-TOFF, Bruker) ou par biologie moléculaire pour E. coli O157H7 (2). Le profil d’antibio-résistance des isolats a été déterminé sur Adagio Automated System (Biorad).Moins de 2 p. 100 des échantillons respectaient les critères microbiologiques d’hygiène du Règlement européen CE n° 2073/2005 (respectivement 70 et 90 p. 100 de non-conformité pour les micro-organismes aérobies et pour E. coli). Au total 111 échantillons (81 p. 100) étaient porteurs au moins d’un micro-organisme potentiellement pathogène ; 74 S. enterica subsp. enterica ont été isolées avec 33 sérovars identifiés dont deux prédominants, Budapest (21 p. 100) et Muenchen (21 p. 100) ; 48 E. coli O157:H7 ont été isolés principalement dans la filière bovine (63 p. 100) ; L. monocytogenes et Campylobacter thermo­tolérants ont été détectés respectivement dans 3 et 2 p. 100 des échantillons, et Y. enterocolitica n’a pas été détectée (tableau I).Les isolats de Salmonella ont été sensibles aux antibiotiques tes­tés, hormis une S. enterica serovar Bahrenfeld qui a résisté aux fluoroquinolones, notamment à la ciprofloxacine. Par ailleurs, 35 souches d’E.coli O157:H7 testées présentaient un phénotype sauvage et huit isolats avaient un phénotype d’hyperproduction de céphalosporinases (tableau II).Les conditions d’hygiène rencontrées sur l’ensemble de la filière bovine et porcine sont nettement insuffisantes et contribuent à la propagation de pathogènes entériques, comme Salmonella enterica et le pathovar Escherichia coli O157:H7. Des phéno­types multirésistants aux antibiotiques émergent, représentant un facteur de risque pour la santé des consommateurs. Par conséquence, nous élargirons le champ des investigations aux abattoirs et aux élevages pour une caractérisation génotypique des isolats qui permettra de rechercher les sources et les moda­lités potentielles de contamination.

Low-income cities that are subject to high population pressure and vulnerable to climate events often have a low capacity to continuously deliver safe drinking water. Here we report the findings of a 32-year investigation of the temporal dynamics of indicators of drinking water quality in the city of Antananarivo, where we assess the long-term evolution of supplied water quality and characterize the interactions between climate conditions and the full-scale supply system. A total of 25,467 water samples were collected every week at different points in the supplied drinking water system. Samples were analyzed for total coliforms (TC), Escherichia coli (EC), intestinal Enterococci (IE), and spores of Clostridia (SSRC). Nine-hundred-eighty-one samples that were identified as positive for one or more indicators were unevenly distributed across the series. The breakpoint method identified four periods when the time series displayed changes in the level and profile of contamination (i) and the monthly pattern of contamination (ii), with more direct effects of rainfall on the quality of supplied drinking water. The modeling showed significantly different lags among indicators of bacteria occurrence after cumulative rainfall, which range from 4 to 8 weeks. Among the effects of low-income urbanization, a rapid demographic transition and urban watershed degradation are progressively affecting the quality of supplied water and resulting in the more direct effects of rainfall events.