Listeria is ubiquitous in natural environments and can be isolated from animal hosts, including rodents. Listeria ivanovii and Listeria monocytogenes are the main pathogenic species that can cause serious listeriosis in animals and human. In this study, we investigated the prevalence of Listeria in wild rodents from six regions in China, and analyzed the molecular characteristics and antibiotics resistance of the L. ivanovii isolates. A total of 702 fecal samples of 25 different species of wild rodents were examined, and 75 were Listeria positive, including 26 L. ivanovii strains, 2 L. monocytogenes strains, and 47 Listeria innocus strains. The 26 L. ivanovii isolates (including 2 subspecies) were divided into 5 different sequence types by multilocus sequence typing with ST6 being the dominant type, and 5 different pulsotypes by pulsed-field gel electrophoresis. The results of antimicrobial susceptibility revealed that all L. ivanovii isolates were sensitive to rifampin, chloramphenicol, gentamicin, erythromycin, tetracycline, vancomycin, penicillin G, imipenem, trimethoprim-sulfamethoxazole, but some isolates (including ST1, ST7, and ST8) were resistant to clindamycin. The results suggest that the prevalence of L. ivanovii (3.7%, 26/702) in wild rodents was higher in some regions, and the genetic diversity of L. ivanovii isolates in the wild rodents is relatively low and most belong to one lineage. These wild rodents may act as the natural host for L. ivanovii and possibly transmit the pathogen between wild animals and humans.
Keywords: MLST; PFGE; antimicrobial susceptibility; genetic diversity.