Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons in Grilled Meats from Restaurants

Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons are a group of lipophilic compounds that can be generated during the preparation of food items at elevated temperatures. They are regarded as potentially genotoxic and carcinogenic to human beings, related to increased incidence of breast and colorectal cancers, oxidative DNA injury, and bad effects on children neuro-differentiation. Thus, they are considered a public health concerns. A total of thirty samples of grilled beef steak, beef kofta and chicken (ten each) were collected from different restaurants. The samples were extracted by magnesium sulfate and sodium acetate in acetonitrile then purified in magnesium sulfate, primary, secondary amine and silica gel, and finally measured by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS). Benzo[a]pyrene was recorded with the highest average level (3.63µg/kg) in grilled kofta samples, but it was not detected in chicken samples. On the other hand, PAH4, PAH8 and ƩPAHs content were more abundant in grilled beef steak (5.32, 9.97 and 56.91µg/kg). Meanwhile, they recorded the least concentrations of grilled chicken from different restaurants. Furthermore, benzo[a]pyrene exceeded the permissible limits of the European Commission and Egyptian National Food Safety Authority in grilled kofta samples; further studies are needed to investigate the limits of exposure to these harmful compounds from meats and other food items

Predominance and Antimicrobial Resistance Profiles of Salmonella and E. coli From Meat and Meat products

This study was conducted to investigate the prevalence, serotypes, and antimicrobial resistance of Salmonella and E. coli isolates recovered from 200 meat and meat products samples (fresh beef, imported frozen meat, imported frozen beef liver, minced beef, beef burger, Egyptian luncheon, kofta and fresh beef sausage), collected randomly from supermarkets and grocery stores at El Fayoum governorate, between September 2019 to July 2020. E. coli was detected in 3% (n= 6/200) and Salmonella in 1.5% (n=3/200) of the total samples, respectively. Salmonella isolates were serotyped as S. Infantis from frozen Brazilian meat, S. Typhimurium from fresh beef sausage and S. Tsevie from fresh minced beef. Serotyping of E. coli showed that E. coli O26:H11, E. coli O91:H21, E. coli O128:H2, and E. coli O124 were isolated from fresh minced beef, frozen beef liver, kofta and beef sausage, respectively. Antimicrobial resistance phenotyping revealed that the isolated Salmonella and E. coli strains were resistant to 60-86.66% and 66.66- 93.33% of the total tested antibiotics, respectively. E. coli strains were positive for blaCTX-M, aadB, Sul1, dfrA, tetA(A), blaSHV, and qnrA, while BlaTEM, BlaCTX-M, qnrA and aadB virulence genes were detected in Salmonella. The antimicrobial resistance genotypic and phenotypic data evaluated in this study would be helpful to estimate the transmission of multilinked antimicrobial resistance genes to human pathogens and the likelihood of consumer exposure to resistant strains.