Examine the Impact of Self-Medicated Antibiotics on Gut Bacterial Diversity From COVID-19 Patients in Gopalganj, Bangladesh

The COVID-19 pandemic has claimed millions of lives globally and continues to pose a threat to public health. It has influenced the self-medication (SM) of antibiotics during the pandemic due to coronaphobia, similar symptoms to flu, cold, respiratory illnesses, insufficiency of reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test, and easy access to the drug, and so forth. Self-medication with antibiotics (SMA) raises the resistance profile of gut bacteria to antibiotics. This cross-sectional study evaluated the connection between antibiotic consumption and the antibiotic-resistant patterns of gut bacteria isolated from 29 COVID-19 patients in Gopalganj, Bangladesh. Standard microbiological tests and molecular methods such as PCR and 16S rRNA sequencing were performed for bacterial identification. The disk diffusion method was used for antibiotic susceptibility testing. A total of 48 bacterial isolates, including Escherichia coli (n = 24), Klebsiella pneumoniae (n = 7), Pseudomonas aeruginosa (n = 7), Salmonella spp. (n = 4), Shigella flexneri (n = 3), Providencia alcalifaciens (n = 1), Proteus vulgaris (n = 1), and Yersinia enterocolitica (n = 1), were identified. The prevalence of SM and multidrug resistance patterns was 65.5% and 89.58%, respectively. Self-medicated COVID-19 patients reported higher antibiotic resistance than patients who consumed prescribed antibiotics regularly. This study demonstrated that, in addition to SMA, other factors such as diet, water, sanitation, and so on can contribute to the development of antibiotic-resistant bacteria. A healthy lifestyle and awareness while using antibiotics can limit our gut microbes from becoming antimicrobial-resistant.