Investigating vegetables from different areas of Shiraz and water used for their irrigation in terms of contamination with bacteria causing foodborne and waterborne diseases in summer 95

since consumption of raw vegetables is part of our daily regimen, their microbial contamination is important for gastrointestinal diseases. The aim of this study is to evaluate not only the contamination of vegetables in different parts of Shiraz, but also the water used to irrigate those same regions in terms of enteropathogenic bacteria.
three types of raw vegetables – leeks, purslane, and basil – as well as water samples used for the irrigation of those vegetables were collected from the vegetable farms of nine different regions in Shiraz. Bacterial culture and biochemical tests were used for the identification of Coliforms and enteropathogens. The identification of different pathotypes of Escherichia Coli (E. coli) was done using molecular tests. Antibiotic susceptibility testing was performed by disc diffusion method.
in these 9 sampling farms, 60, 50, 50, 28.5, 33.5, 33.5, 60, 40, and 16.5 per cent of isolated bacteria in genus level were similar between the vegetables from the 9 sampling farms, and the water samples of the same regions. We isolated two enter hemorrhagic E. coli from purslane and one Aeromonas hydrophila from the water sample. All three isolates were susceptible to broad spectrum beta-lactams.
The microbial contamination of the water used to irrigate the raw vegetables has affected their health and this could cause gastrointestinal diseases. This indicates that the quality control of these resources in terms of microbial contamination is valuable not only for maintaining public health, but also for preventing gastrointestinal outbreaks.