This work is aimed at isolating Staphylococcus aureus from the Nigerian currency notes in circulation in amai metropolis. Twenty eight samples of the Nigerian currency note, ranging from 5 naira bill to 1000 naira bills were obtained from different source in Amai metropolis. The bills were sampled for the presence of gram-positive isolates and Staphylococcus aureus using standard microbiological methods. laboratory analysis showed that the currency notes obtained from the butcher shop had the highest percentage of staphylococcus aureus and gram positive isolates with 17 (24.64%) and 6 (23.08%) respectively. While bills obtained from the motorcyclist had 6 (8.7%) of gram positive isolates and 3 (11.5%) of s. aureus which was the least percentage isolated from the bills. Further analysis on the bills showed that the 5 naira bills had the highest number of S. aureus with 9 (34.62%) isolates while the 1000 naira had the least percentage of Staphylococcus isolates with 1(3.85%) isolates. antimicrobial profiling also showed that 33% of S. aureus isolated from the bills were methicillin resistant isolates. other bacteria species concurrently isolated included; diphtheriod, Bacillus sp and Streptococcus sp. the prevalence of s. aureus and methicillin resistant s. aureus in the naira bill in this study poses a serious public health crisis since the organism is known to cause infections that can lead to high mortality rate, especially when commonly used antibiotics are no longer effective in its treatment. Hence strict hygiene practice should be exercised when handling currency notes in other to curb the high rate of transmission posed by these currency notes.
Keywords: Staphylococcus Aureus, currency notes, economic value, methicillin
