IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jijerp/v12y2015i5p4533-4545d48713.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Common Features of Opportunistic Premise Plumbing Pathogens

Author

Listed:
  • Joseph O. Falkinham

    (Department of Biological Sciences, Virginia Tech., 1405 Perry Street, Blacksburg, VA 24061, USA)

Abstract

Recently it has been estimated that the annual cost of diseases caused by the waterborne pathogens Legionella pneumonia , Mycobacterium avium , and Pseudomonas aeruginosa is $500 million. For the period 2001–2012, the estimated cost of hospital admissions for nontuberculous mycobacterial pulmonary disease, the majority caused by M. avium , was almost $1 billion. These three waterborne opportunistic pathogens are normal inhabitants of drinking water—not contaminants—that share a number of key characteristics that predispose them to survival, persistence, and growth in drinking water distribution systems and premise plumbing. Herein, I list and describe these shared characteristics that include: disinfectant-resistance, biofilm-formation, growth in amoebae, growth at low organic carbon concentrations (oligotrophic), and growth under conditions of stagnation. This review is intended to increase awareness of OPPPs, identify emerging OPPPs, and challenge the drinking water industry to develop novel approaches toward their control.

Suggested Citation

  • Joseph O. Falkinham, 2015. "Common Features of Opportunistic Premise Plumbing Pathogens," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 12(5), pages 1-13, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:12:y:2015:i:5:p:4533-4545:d:48713
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/12/5/4533/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/12/5/4533/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Deepti Prasad Karumathil & Hsin-Bai Yin & Anup Kollanoor-Johny & Kumar Venkitanarayanan, 2014. "Effect of Chlorine Exposure on the Survival and Antibiotic Gene Expression of Multidrug Resistant Acinetobacter baumannii in Water," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 11(2), pages 1-11, February.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Luisa Marras & Giacomo Bertolino & Adriana Sanna & Valentina Carraro & Valentina Coroneo, 2023. "Legionella spp. Monitoring in the Water Supply Systems of Accommodation Facilities in Sardinia, Italy: A Two-Year Retrospective Analysis," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 20(18), pages 1-9, September.
    2. Brandon Leftwich & Samuel T. Opoku & Jingjing Yin & Atin Adhikari, 2021. "Assessing Hotel Employee Knowledge on Risk Factors and Risk Management Procedures for Microbial Contamination of Hotel Water Distribution Systems," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(7), pages 1-14, March.
    3. Aashka Parikh & Christopher Vinnard & Nicole Fahrenfeld & Amy L. Davidow & Amee Patrawalla & Alfred Lardizabal & Andrew Gow & Reynold Panettieri & Maria Gennaro, 2019. "Revisiting John Snow to Meet the Challenge of Nontuberculous Mycobacterial Lung Disease," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 16(21), pages 1-17, November.
    4. Stefania Paduano & Isabella Marchesi & Maria Elisabetta Casali & Federica Valeriani & Giuseppina Frezza & Elena Vecchi & Luca Sircana & Vincenzo Romano Spica & Paola Borella & Annalisa Bargellini, 2020. "Characterisation of Microbial Community Associated with Different Disinfection Treatments in Hospital hot Water Networks," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 17(6), pages 1-17, March.
    5. Samuel Dorevitch, 2015. "Health Effects of Waterborne Contaminants: A Focus on Emerging Concerns," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 12(10), pages 1-3, October.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Niklas Pleger & Beatrix Kloft & David Quarcoo & Simona Zitnik & Stefanie Mache & Doris Klingelhoefer & David A Groneberg, 2014. "Bacterial Meningitis: A Density-Equalizing Mapping Analysis of the Global Research Architecture," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 11(10), pages 1-13, September.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:12:y:2015:i:5:p:4533-4545:d:48713. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.