Prevalence of Bacillus cereus in Ready-to-Eat Foods in Northern Perak, Malaysia

Food poisoning cases in Malaysia showed an increasing trend every year where 496 episodes were reported in 2018 as compared to 401 episodes in the same week of the year 2017. Bacillus cereus is one of the foodborne pathogens related to food poisoning cases in Malaysia. The main cause for the outbreak of B. cereus is the unregulated temperature during holding time. This study was conducted to detect the presence of aerobic bacteria and B. cereus present in ready-to-eat food in Northern Perak. A total of 83 food samples were collected and analyzed for the microbial count. The result shows that aerobic bacteria and B. cereus were detected in 28% of the samples. B. cereus count in food samples tested ranged from 100 cfu/g to 42000 cfu/g, whereas the aerobic bacteria recorded a range of 500 cfu/g to 2100000 cfu/g. The highest percentage of B. cereus was found in rice-based food, followed by meat, poultry, and gravy dishes. Positive colonies of B. cereus were further tested for anti-microbial resistance profile. Most B. cereus isolates showed resistance to tetracycline and clindamycin.