Characterization of Streptococcus equi subsp. zooepidemicus isolates containing lnuB gene responsible for the L phenotype

Within the framework of the β-hemolytic streptococci surveillance carried out by the National Reference Laboratory from Uruguay, three putative Streptococcus equi subsp. zooepidemicus (SEZ) were received from different health centers. Being these the first reports associated with human infections in Uruguay, the objective of this work was to confirm their identification, to determine their genetic relationship and to study their antibiotic susceptibility. Using four different methods, they were identified as SEZ, a subspecies which has been described as the etiologic agent of rare and severe zoonosis in a few cases in other countries. The three isolates presented different pulsotypes by PFGE; however, two of them appeared to be related and were confirmed as ST431 by MLST, while the remaining isolate displayed ST72. Their resistance profile exhibited an unexpected feature: despite all of them were susceptible to macrolides, they showed different levels of resistance to clindamycin, i.e. they had the so-called “L phenotype”. This rare trait is known to be due to a nucleotidyl-transferase, encoded by genes of the lnu family. Although this phenotype was previously described in a few SEZ isolates, its genetic basis has not been studied yet. This was now analyzed by PCR in the three isolates and they were found to contain a lnuB gene. The lnuB sequence was identical among the three isolates and with many lnuB sequences deposited in data banks. In conclusion, for the first time in Uruguay, three SEZ isolates recovered from non-epidemiologically related cases of human invasive infection were identified. Moreover, this is the first report about the presence of a lnu gene in the S. equi species, revealing the active lateral spread of the lnuB in a new streptococcal host.