Indicator bacteria
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 |
This article may require cleanup to meet Wikipedia's quality standards. Please discuss this issue on the talk page or replace this tag with a more specific message. This article has been tagged since January 2007. |
Each gram of human feces contains approximately 10 billion (109) bacteria, among them may include pathogenic bacteria, such as Salmonella. In addition, feces may contain pathogenic viruses, protozoa and parasites. If ingested, these organisms can cause sickness and disease. The variety and often low concentrations of pathogens makes them difficult to test for individually and health authorities use the presence of other more abundant and more easily detected fecal bacteria as indicators of the presence of fecal contamination.
Indicator bacteria are not themselves dangerous to the health but are used to indicate the presence of a health risk.
The most popularized known indicator bacteria are the fecal coliforms.
