Antibiotic resistance increases the cost of treatment of infections and
can be the cause of therapeutic failure (Andersson and Hughes, 2010).
The spread of antibiotic resistance to human and animal pathogens is
therefore of great concern. The food chain is thought to be one of the
main routes via which such resistance spreads (Rossi et al., 2014). The
transfer of genes fromresistant to susceptible bacteriamay occur during
food manufacture or during transit through the gastrointestinal tract
(Rossi et al., 2014; Gazzola et al., 2012). Fermented foods, such as
cheese, in which several bacterial types grow to high cell densities,
are key players in the transmission of antibiotic resistance between
beneficial/commensal and pathogenic bacteria (Nawaz et al., 2011).
Complex bacterial communities composed of the natural cheesemicrobiota
plus an array of environmental microorganisms develop and
change in fermented foods over time, particularly in starter-free, rawmilk
cheeses (Flórez and Mayo, 2006).