Microbiological Quality and Antimicrobial Resistance of Commercial Probiotic Products for Food-Producing Animals.

Probiotics have been popularly used in livestock production as an alternative to antibiotics. This study aimed to investigate the microbiological quality and phenotypic and genotypic antimicrobial resistance of bacteria in probiotic products sold for food animals. A total of 45 probiotic products were examined for the number of viable cells, species, and antimicrobial susceptibility; the contamination of and ; and the presence of 112 genes encoding resistance to clinically important antimicrobials and transferability of AMR determinants.