Gram-negative, non-fermenting bacteria are an emergent worry in medical situations and are becoming a growing cause of severe infections. Pathogens of this type are opportunistic and include many different bacterial species, such as Ralstonia spp., Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Sphingomonas paucimobilis and Brevundimonas spp. [1–5]. Gram-negative, non-fermenting bacteria can infect both patients undergoing treatments and individuals outside of a clinical setting with various underlying conditions or diseases. Another type of these bacteria are the members of the α-proteobacterial genus Ochrobactrum [6].
Ochrobactrum spp. are found in a wide variety of environments including water, aircraft water, soil, plants and animals [6–12]. Several Ochrobactrum spp. have been investigated for their potential to degrade xenobiotic pollutants and for heavy metal detoxification under a variety of environmental conditions [13–16]. Ochrobactrum spp. are very closely related to brucellae, and even though they are considered to be of low virulence, they have increasingly been found to cause infections (some serious including endocarditis and septicaemia) in immunocompetent hosts [17,18]
Investigation of the scientific/medical literature presented a wide variety of infections resultant from Ochrobactrum spp. and these were resistant to wide variety of antibiotics. Our data point to the genus being a more common pathogen than previously supposed, with many of the infections/conditions caused by Ochrobactrum spp. being aggressive and debilitating.