Next steps for wastewater testing to help end this pandemic — and prevent the next one
By Aparna Keshaviah
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During the early months of the Covid-19 pandemic, cities began tapping their wastewater to look for evidence of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes Covid-19. Now, more than a year into the pandemic, it’s clear that sewage surveillance carries several advantages over traditional surveillance.
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Conveniently, wastewater samples are already being routinely collected and tested at more than 16,000 existing wastewater treatment plants. Surveillance for public health biomarkers essentially entails add-on tests for those samples. In other words, this approach is both pragmatic and scalable. It’s also a force multiplier: One test, costing from $300 to $1,200, can be used to monitor infections among hundreds, thousands, or millions of residents in a city, or to monitor the residents of a single dormitory, nursing home, or correctional facility.
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Beyond replacing old pipes and dangerously outdated physical infrastructure, which received a D-plus rating on the 2021 infrastructure report card, funding from the American Jobs Plan could support development of sentinel warning plans in sewer systems across the country, along with the often overlooked translational research needed to determine how wastewater data can inform the work of public health and public safety officials.
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