Story at a glance
- The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced data from its National Wastewater Surveillance System were now publicly viewable.
- The data reflect over 34,000 wastewater samples collected around the country, representing about 53 million Americans.
- Between 40 to 80 percent of people that have COVID-19 shed viral RNA in their feces, making it an opportunity to track the spread of the virus.
Scientists and health officials have been implementing a variety of strategies to track COVID-19, and now the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is ramping up one specific strategy that involves Americans’ toilets.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) announced the agency was ramping up its National Wastewater Surveillance System, a public health tool intended to build the nation’s capacity to track the presence of SARS-CoV2, the virus that causes COVID-19, in wastewater samples across the country.
For the first time, data from the National Wastewater Surveillance System is publicly available and viewable through the CDC’s COVID-19 data tracker. So far, only data in a handful of states can be seen, as the agency plans to ramp up surveillance throughout the country in the coming weeks and months.
In a press briefing on Friday, Amy Kirby, program lead for CDC’s National Wastewater Surveillance System, explained that between 40 to 80 percent of people with COVID-19 shed viral RNA in their feces. That makes wastewater and sewage an important opportunity for monitoring the spread of COVID-19 infection.
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The National Wastewater Surveillance System isn’t new, as the CDC launched the initiative in September of 2020 and so far, has collected over 34,000 samples, representing approximately 53 million Americans.
Kirby said the CDC is currently supporting 37 states, four cities and two territories to help develop wastewater surveillance systems in their communities. More than 400 testing sites around the country have already begun wastewater surveillance efforts.
“The real power of this program will be more evident in the coming weeks when hundreds more testing sites will begin submitting data. The information generated by wastewater surveillance offers public health officials a better understanding of COVID-19 trends in communities,” said Kirby.
The CDC defines wastewater, also referred to as sewage, as water from households or buildings that use toilets, showers and sinks that can contain human fecal waste, as well as water from non-household sources, like rain and industrial use.
Wastewater is collected into a treatment plant, where samples are sent to environmental or public health labs for COVID-19 testing. The health departments then submit testing data to the CDC through the National Water Surveillance System, which then analyzes the data and reports results back to the health department for use in their COVID-19 response.
This process of wastewater surveillance serves as an “early warning system” for the emergence of COVID-19 in a community, as Kirby said it can capture the presence of COVID-19 infections from people with and without symptoms.
Public health agencies have also used wastewater surveillance data to forecast changes in hospital utilization, using the additional time to mobilize resources and prepare for the potential of increasing COVID-19 cases.
The state of Michigan began a pilot program to run wastewater surveillance back in 2020 and ended up granting $10 million from the state’s allocation of federal COVID-19 relief money towards the effort.
“Since nearly 70 percent of Michigan resident rely on public wastewater systems, this COVID-19 surveillance program has the potential to provide critical, life-saving data on COVID-19 transmission within a large portion of Michigan’s population,” said Liesl Clark, director of the state’s pilot project.
Wastewater surveillance isn’t a new trend, as Kirby said it was used to track polio in communities overseas.
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