Abstract

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Ready-to-eat foods are easily recontaminated by microbes during post processing and may be the cause of food borne diseases. Food samples analyzed were Doughnut, Fried snail, Boiled yam/stew, Smoked fish, Moi-moi, Jollof rice, Eba and Gala obtained from vendors in Egor, Ikpoba Okha, Ovia North-East and Oredo Local Government Area (LGA) all in Benin City. The collected ready-to-eat foods were taken to the laboratory and analyzed immediately as 0 h and the other part was stored in a cool box for 8 hr. Pour-plated method was used for heterotrophic bacterial and Staphylococcal count on nutrient agar and mannitol salt agar respectively. Polymerase chain reaction assay was employed for the detection of femA and Staphylococcal enterotoxin (A, B, C, D and E) genes. The heterotrophic bacterial and Staphylococcal counts of the food samples increased after 8hr of storage. The highest bacterial count of 10.30±0.05 x106cfu/ml was from doughnut obtained from Ikpoba Okha LGA and the least was 1.90±0.10x106cfu/ml from fried snail obtained from Egor LGA. The highest Staphylococcal count was 4.00±0.20x106cfu/ml from doughnut obtained from Ikpoba Okha LGA and the least was 0.75±0.05x106cfu/ml from fried snail obtained from Ovia N/E LGA. The identified bacterial isolates were Bacillus cereus, B. subtilis, Corynebacterium kustcheri, C. xerosis, Escherichia coli, Micrococcus varians, Staphylococcus aureus, S. epidermidis, and S. intermidius. Micrococcus varians had the highest frequency of occurrence (11.75%). All the S. aureus isolated from the food samples obtained from the four LGAs harboured 100% femA and 75% SEE genes. The study showed that ready-to-eat foods are prone to serious contamination by potentially hazardous organisms whose population and toxigenicity increases with time.

Keywords: Foods, Staphylococcus aureus, enterotoxin, bacteria, PCR.