| Summary: | COVID-19 offers ideal premises for bacteria to develop antimicrobial resistance. In this study, we evaluated the presence of several antimicrobial resistance genes (ARG) in vancomycin-resistant <i>Enterococcus</i> (VRE) isolated from rectal swabs from patients at a hospital in Cluj-Napoca, Romania. Rectal swabs were cultivated on CHROMID<sup>®</sup> VRE (bioMérieux, Marcy—l’ Étoile, France) and positive isolates were identified using MALDI-TOF Mass Spectrometry (Bruker Daltonics, Bremen, Germany) and further analyzed using the PCR technique for the presence of the following ARGs: <i>van A</i>, <i>van B</i>, <i>tet(M)</i>, <i>tet(L)</i>, <i>ermB</i>, <i>msrA</i>, <i>mefA</i>, <i>aac(6′)-Im</i>, <i>aph(2)-Ib</i>, <i>ant(4′)-Ia</i>, <i>sul1</i>, <i>sul2</i>, <i>sul3</i>, and <i>NDM1</i>. We isolated and identified 68 isolates of <i>Enterococcus faecium</i> and 11 isolates of <i>Enterococcus faecalis</i>. The molecular analysis showed 66 isolates positive for the <i>vanA</i> gene and eight positive for <i>vanB</i>. The most frequent association of ARG in VRE was <i>vanA-tet(M)-ermB</i>. There was no statistically significant difference between <i>Enterococcus faecium</i> and <i>Enterococcus faecalis</i> regarding ARGs. Our work proves that during the COVID-19 pandemic, highly resistant isolates of <i>Enterococcus</i> were present in patients in the intensive care unit; thus, better healthcare policies should be implemented for the management and control of these highly resistant isolates in the future.
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