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. 2024 Sep 27;12(10):1953.
doi: 10.3390/microorganisms12101953.

Sanitary Waters: Is It Worth Looking for Mycobacteria?

Angela Cannas  1 , Francesco Messina  1 , Paola Dal Monte  2   3 , Francesco Bisognin  2 , Giorgio Dirani  4 , Silvia Zannoli  4 , Giulia Gatti  3 , Ornella Butera  1 , Vincenzo Ferraro  2 , Carla Nisii  1 , Elena Vecchi  5 , Giovanna Mattei  5 , Giuseppe Diegoli  5 , Antonio Santoro  3 , Gian Luigi Belloli  5 , Enrico Girardi  1 , Tiziana Lazzarotto  2   3 , Vittorio Sambri  3   4 , Carla Fontana  1
Affiliations

Sanitary Waters: Is It Worth Looking for Mycobacteria?

Angela Cannas et al. Microorganisms. .

Abstract

The freshwater environment is suitable for nontuberculous mycobacteria (NTMs) growth. Their high adaptability represents a considerable risk for sanitary water systems, which are a potential vector for NTMs transmission. This study investigated the occurrence of NTMs, such as Mycobacterium saskatchewanense, in hospital water systems to support the surveillance and control of potentially pathogenic NTMs. We analyzed 722 ultrapure dialysis fluid samples from Emilia Romagna Dialysis Services. Among these, 35 samples were found to be positive for M. saskatchewanense. The strains were characterized using whole-genome sequencing (WGS) and variability analysis was carried out along the whole M. saskatchewanense genome. This investigation revealed the exclusive presence of M. saskatchewanense in these dialysis machines, with low genetic variability among all strains (with a low number of different alleles: <15). The strong similarity among the strain groups was also confirmed in the WGS-based ML tree, with very few significant nodes, and no clusters were identified. This research highlights the necessity of implementing surveillance protocols and investigating any potential link to human infections, as well as stressing the urgency of enhancing surveillance and infection control measures.

Keywords: Mycobacterium saskatchewanense; dialysis water; nontuberculous mycobacteria; whole-genome sequencing.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Minimum spanning tree of 35 M. saskatchawanense isolates based on cgMLST analysis using SeqSphere+ RIDOM (version 9.0.10 2023/9). software with the reference genome (ID GenBank NZ_AP022573.1). Each circle represents a strain, the position of which is based on the sequence analysis of 5090 target genes. The colors indicate the city where the strains were isolated, as reported in the legend. The numbers on the connecting lines illustrate the allelic distances between strains. Most of these differences are associated with <15 alleles.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Unrooted phylogenetic ML tree based on the whole genomes of 35 M. saskatchawanense isolates collected in this study. The black dots are nodes with a significance >80%.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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