Intestinal bacteria of newborn Ethiopian infants in relation to antibiotic treatment and colonisation by potentially pathogenic gram-negative bacteria.

The aerobic and anaerobic intestinal microflora of 60 newborn infants in Addis Ababa was studied. As opposed to earlier published studies from Stockholm, there were no consistent changes of the microflora attributable to antibiotic treatment. The reason why antimicrobial agents caused quantitatively smaller changes of the intestinal microflora in newborn infants in Addis Ababa than in Stockholm is not known, but may be due to antimicrobial inactivation, or marked, continuous ingestion of bacteria. Colonisation by potentially pathogenic gram-negative bacteria was coupled to a low isolation rate of bifidobacterium, but not of lactobacillus. This is consistent with the hypothesis that bifidobacterium might convey some kind of resistance to colonisation by and overgrowth of gram-negative bacteria in newborn infants. Similar results have previously been obtained in Stockholm. In comparison to 45 healthy infants in Stockholm, the Ethiopian infants had more enterococcus and lactobacillus and less staphylococcus and bacteroides during the first 2 weeks of life. After that time, the only difference was more frequent colonisation by lactobacillus in Addis Ababa.