Studies done in Burkina Faso, Korea and Lebanon also
showed presence of E. coli contaminants harboring virulence
genes in fresh poultry meat (with prevalence of
43%, 14% and 14% respectively) and that that ETEC,
EPEC and STEC were the most common diarrheagenic
E. coli detected [59-61]. This could be because ETEC,
EPEC and STEC are much frequently implicated in
various food and water borne diseases and they are
known contaminants of meat and meat products [62,63].
Studies, for instance in Canada, Spain and Minnesota
U.S.A, have also shown that live chicken and other
food animals are known reservoirs of these pathogenic
E. coli and therefore contamination could actually be
from the animal during evisceration or even from
water used during their processing [64-66]. On the
other hand EIEC and EaggEC are not implicated much
in food and water borne illnesses and there are no
known animal reservoirs for these pathogens hence any
primary source of contamination appears to be infected
humans [63,67]. Another reason for this observation in
this study is that ETEC had several virulent gene markers
compared to the rest and thus could be easily detected
more than the others. These results are important as they
indicate that apart from being highly contaminated with
coliforms which could lead to quick spoilage, raw retail
chicken in Nairobi, Kenya is a potential source of food
borne illnesses as it carries pathogenic E. coli. This has
important implications and present unique challenges for
interventions for microbial contamination of retail chicken
meats in urban settings.