Pharyngeal Carriage of Pathogenic Bacteria in Healthy School Going Children in Coastal Karnataka

Abstract

Background: The bacterial throat colonization in children can aid in the transmission of bacterial pathogens to healthy individuals in the community through droplets or secretions and can lead to cause the infectious diseases with varying severity.

Objective: To detect the pharyngeal carriage of pathogenic bacteria among healthy School going children in Udupi, coastal Karnataka.

Materials and Method: The community based cross-sectional study was conducted by collecting throat swabs from 796 healthy school going children of age group 5-15 years in Udupi, a region in coastal Karnataka. Throat swabs were cultured and processed in the laboratory for microbiological analysis. Antibiotic susceptibility testing was performed for all bacterial isolates. 

Result: Bacteria were isolated from 21 (2.6%) healthy School going children.  Methicillin sensitive Staphylococcus aureus 10 (48%) was predominant, followed by 8 (38%) Klebsiella pneumoniae and Streptococcus anginosus 3 (14%) as a major group of bacterial isolates. No polymicrobial carriage was detected. All the bacteria were susceptible to the antibiotics used in the study.  The presence of bacteria in the throat was associated with passive smoking and indoor air pollution.

Conclusion: The prevalence of pathogenic bacteria from throat swab in healthy School going children found to be low. Health awareness about a healthy lifestyle in the community population could be the factors that have reduced the prevalence of disease and its transmission.