Sciensano Publications Repository
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The Belgian RE-Place platform: a valuable tool in paving the road towards non-animal testing in toxicology
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Validated UHPLC Methods for Melatonin Quantification Reveal Regulatory Violations in EU Online Dietary Supplements Commerce
No full textUncovering Hidden Risks: The identification of the ROOT cause of a supplement-induced cardiotoxic event
No full textHet Belgisch eHandbook voor (hemato-)oncologische ondersteunende zorg
No full textOndersteunende zorg is onmisbaar binnen de oncologische zorg. Toch bestaan in België nog ongelijkheden in de toegang tot ondersteunende zorg voor
kankerpatiënten. Om dit aan te pakken werd het BeONCOSup-initiatief opgericht door het Kankercentrum van Sciensano, een Belgisch Wetenschappelijk instituut voor de volksgezondheid. Dit initiatief brengt verschillende nationale en Europese projecten samen die (volledig of gedeeltelijk) gericht zijn op ondersteunende zorg en survivorship bij kanker.</p
National Food Consumption Survey 2022-2023 - Report on Food Safety
No full textThe National Food Consumption Survey (FCS) 2022-2023 examined not only what people living in Belgium eat but also how they handle food at home. A dedicated food safety module collected information on everyday practices, including hygiene, cooking, storage, and awareness of expiration dates. Adults aged 18 years and older answered for themselves, while parents or guardians answered on behalf of children aged 3 to 9 years. This module makes it possible to map current habits and compare some of them with the previous survey conducted in 2014-2015.
More results are available on our website.</p
Mapping the spread of fluoroquinolone resistance: continued presence of non-susceptible in broilers.
No full textINTRODUCTION: Sustained resistance against fluoroquinolones (FQ), without the use of FQ in broilers, raises important questions about other possible factors contributing to the persistence in farms. Therefore, the current study investigates the prevalence of FQ non-susceptibility in on broiler farms and examines the roles of day-old chicks, the farm environment, and the antimicrobial use (AMU) in the dynamics of the within-flock spread.
METHODS: On 29 Belgian broiler farms, AMU was monitored, while environmental and day-old chick intestinal samples (day 0) were collected before their arrival. On days 3 and 36 of the production round, 30 cloacal swabs were taken per farm. In all samples, total and FQ non susceptible isolates were quantified by non-selective and FQ selective isolation. A selection of the isolates was analyzed using whole-genome sequencing to characterize their resistance and virulence-associated determinants and to investigate their phylogenetic relatedness using core-genome multi-locus sequence typing (cgMLST) and whole-genome single-nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) analysis.
RESULTS: Before entering the stable, day-old chicks carried FQ non-susceptible on 79.3% of the farms, while FQ non-susceptible were found in 48.3% of the sampled environments. According to cgMLST, identical FQ non-susceptible isolates were found on day 0 and 36, suggesting that FQ non-susceptible isolates present in the environment at the start of a production round or in day-old chicks, can remain present until slaughter, even when no FQs were used. Total AMU was positively correlated with the proportion of FQ non-susceptible [ = 0.42, 95% CI (0.06, 0.68), = 0.03], often also multidrug-resistant, at the end of the production cycle.
CONCLUSION: The continued presence of FQ non-susceptible in broiler farms is likely the result of both a historical contamination at the farm level and a continuous influx along the production chain. AMU contributes to the continued presence of FQ non-susceptible in broiler farms, but accounted for only a small proportion of the variability in FQ non-susceptibility in currently investigated farms. The role of certain virulence-associated genes in the persistence of FQ non-susceptible in broiler farms deserves more in-depth research.</p
