The Rising Tide of Antimicrobial Resistance in Aquaculture: Sources, Sinks and Solutions

As the human population increases there is an increasing reliance on aquaculture to supply a safe, reliable, and economic supply of food. Although food production is essential for a healthy population, an increasing threat to global human health is antimicrobial resistance. Extensive antibiotic resistant strains are now being detected; the spread of these strains could greatly reduce medical treatment options available and increase deaths from previously curable infections. Antibiotic resistance is widespread due in part to clinical overuse and misuse; however, the natural processes of horizontal gene transfer and mutation events that allow genetic exchange within microbial populations have been ongoing since…

• UD
  U.S. Department of Agriculture

  Award: Z5659004
• UO
  University of Portsmouth
• DF
  Directorate for Biological Sciences