Background: Spain is among the main receptor countries for immigration; but there are few studies available which target antibiotic-resistance in immigrants. Our objective was to review the current knowledge on the impact of antibiotic resistance in immigrants compared with the prevalence in the autochthonous population.
Methods: A comprehensive bibliographical search was performed to detect published works in the 1998-2013 period. Common keywords were: resistance; immigrant, and Spain; particular keywords were: Mycobacterium tuberculosis, Neisseria gonorrhoeae, or Enterobacteriaceae and travellers in each topic.
Results: Global percentage of resistant M. tuberculosis strains was 2.5-4 times more frequent in immigrant population than native population. The proportion of MDR strains was also higher in adult and infant immigrant populations (2,5% and 4,5% respectively) than in native population (0,1%-0% respectively). Known cases of gonorrhoea among immigrant population represented 28%, proceeding from geographical areas with high resistance to macrolide (30%) and cephalosporins (20%). This data reveals the possibility of dissemination of untreatable N. gonorrhoeae strains. The detection of multidrug-resistant Enterobacteriaceae in Spaniard travellers visiting countries with high rates of antibiotic resistance was increased from 7.9% to 17.9% (even 37.4% in native travellers from India).
Conclusion: The different rates of antibiotic resistance between native and immigrant populations in the studied models in this review, revealed as the migration can affect to emergence and re-emergence of infection diseases, but also the potential spreading of untreatable microorganisms.