The findings, published Thursday in the British medical journal The Lancet Infectious Diseases, indicate that the bacterial strain NDM-1 -- named after New Delhi -- is no longer a hospital-born infection but is found in the environment.

Researchers collected 50 public tap water samples and 171 swabs of seepage water from sites within a 7.45-mile radius of central New Delhi from September-October last year.

The NDM-1 gene was found in two of the 50 drinking water samples and 51 of 171 seepage samples.

Researchers then identified 11 new species of bacteria carrying the NDM-1 gene, including strains that cause cholera and dysentery.

Study leader Professor Timothy Walsh of Cardiff University referred to the results as "extremely worrying."

"We found resistant bacteria in public water used for drinking, washing and food preparation and also in pools and rivulets in heavily populated areas where children play," he said, the BBC reports.

"The spread of resistance to cholera and to a potential-untreatable strain of dysentery is also a cause for extreme concern."

The transfer rate -- the rate at which the NDM-1 gene is copied and transferred between different bacteria -- was highest at 86 degrees Fahrenheit, the temperature prevalent in New Delhi for seven months of the year, from April to October, the researchers say.

Those months include the monsoon season, when floods and drain overflows are common and could spread the resistant bacteria.

While oral-fecal transmission of drug-resistant bacteria is a problem worldwide, the study said, In India, "this transmission represents a serious problem as 650 million citizens do not have access to a flush toilet and even more probably do not have access to clean water."

Studies are being carried out by collecting environmental and fecal samples from a city close to New Delhi to determine the severity of the situation, said Mohammed Shahid of the Jawaharlal Nehru Medical College and Hospital in India's Uttar Pradesh, The Times of India reports.

The publication Thursday of the study findings coincides with World Health Day, which this year is dedicated to preserving the healing powers of existing antibiotics.

"In the absence of urgent corrective and protective actions, the world is heading towards a post-antibiotic era, in which many common infections will no longer have a cure," said World Health Organization Director General Dr. Margaret Chan, in a statement.

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