Journal Article

Aquaculture at the crossroads of global warming and antimicrobial resistance

Combe, Marine, Avarre, Jean-Christophe, Reverter, Miriam, Caruso, Domenico, Pepey, Elodie, Vega-Heredía, Sarahi, de Verdal, Hugues, Gozlan, Rodolphe E., Sarter, Samira, Pouyaud, Laurent

2020

Overview

In many developing countries, aquaculture is key to ensuring food security for millions of people. It is thus important to measure the full implications of environmental changes on the sustainability of aquaculture. We conduct a double meta-analysis (460 articles) to explore how global warming and antimicrobial resistance (AMR) impact aquaculture. We calculate a Multi-Antibiotic Resistance index (MAR) of aquaculture-related bacteria (11,274 isolates) for 40 countries, of which mostly low- and middle-income countries present high AMR levels. Here we show that aquaculture MAR indices correlate with MAR indices from human clinical bacteria, temperature and countries’ climate vulnerability. We also find that infected aquatic animals present higher mortalities at warmer temperatures. Countries most vulnerable to climate change will probably face the highest AMR risks, impacting human health beyond the aquaculture sector, highlighting the need for urgent action. Sustainable solutions to minimise antibiotic use and increase system resilience are therefore needed. Global environmental changes threaten many food-producing sectors, including aquaculture. Here the authors show that countries most vulnerable to climate change will probably face the highest antimicrobial resistance in aquaculture-related bacteria, and that infected aquatic animals have higher mortality at warmer temperatures.

• Publisher: Nature Publishing Group UK,Nature Publishing Group,Nature Portfolio
• Subject: 631/158/2165 / 631/326/22/1434 / 704/286 / 704/829/826 / Agricultural sciences / Animal biology / Animal production studies / Animals / Anti-Bacterial Agents - pharmacology / Antibiotic resistance / Antibiotics / Antimicrobial agents / Antimicrobial resistance / Aquaculture / Aquatic animals / Bacteria / Bacteria - drug effects / Bacteria - pathogenicity / Bioclimatology / Climate Change / Developing countries / Drug resistance / Drug Resistance, Bacterial - drug effects / Ecology / Ecology, environment / Environmental changes / Environmental impact / Food / Food security / Global Warming / Humanities and Social Sciences / Humans / LDCs / Life Sciences / Marine Biology / multidisciplinary / Science / Science (multidisciplinary) / Sustainability / Sustainable aquaculture / Temperature / Veterinary medicine and animal Health