Potential impacts of disinfection processes on elimination and deactivation of antibiotic resistance genes during water and wastewater treatment

Antibiotic resistance genes (ARGs), in association with antibiotic resistant bacteria (ARB), have been identified as widespread contaminants of treated drinking waters and wastewaters. As a consequence, concerns have been raised that ARB or ARG transport between aquatic compartments may enhance the spread of antibiotic resistance amongst non-resistant bacterial communities by means of horizontal gene transfer processes. Most often, discussion of horizontal gene transfer focuses on the probable role of conjugative plasmid or transposon exchange, which requires live ARB donor cells. Conventional water and wastewater disinfection processes generally provide highly effective means for mitigating the transport of live ARB; thereby minimizing risks of conjugative gene transfer. However, even if ARB present in a treated water are fully inactivated during a disinfection process, the possibility remains that intact remnants of DNA contained within the resulting cell debris could still confer resistance genotypes to downstream bacterial populations by means of natural transformation and/or transduction, which do not require live donor cells. Thus, a systematic evaluation of the capability of common disinfection technologies to ensure the destruction of bacterial DNA, in addition to pathogen inactivation, seems warranted. With that objective in mind, this review seeks to provide a concise introduction to the significance of ARB and ARG occurrence in environmental systems, coupled with a review of the role that commonly used water and wastewater disinfection processes may play in minimizing ARG transport and dissemination.