Characterization of Streptococcus pneumoniae invasive serotype 19A isolates recovered in Colombia

The aim of this study was to determine the molecular characterization of invasive penicillin non-susceptible Streptococcus pneumoniae serotype 19A isolates, collected in Colombia between 1994 and 2012. A total of 115 isolates serotype 19A were analyzed. Genetic relationship of 80 isolates with minimal inhibitory concentration (MIC) to penicillin ≥0.125 μg/was determined by pulsed-field gel electrophoresis (PFGE) and selected strains were studied by multilocus sequence typing (MLST). Among the 115 isolates, resistance to penicillin in meningitis was 64.2%, in non-meningitis 32.2% were intermediate and 1.1% were high resistance. The most frequent sequence types were ST320 (33.7%), ST276 (21.5%), and ST1118 (11.2%). Five isolates were associated with the Spain^9V-ST156 clone, and two isolates were related to Colombia^23F-ST338 clone. S. pneumoniae serotype 19A increased in Colombia was associated with the spread of isolates genetically related to ST320 and ST276, and emergence of capsular variants of worldwide-disseminated clones.