Wastewater surveillance

Wastewater surveillance is the process of monitoring wastewater for contaminants. Amongst other uses, it can be used for biosurveillance, to detect the presence of pathogens in local populations,[1] and to detect the presence of psychoactive drugs.[2]

Wastewater sampling flowchart

One example of this is the use of wastewater monitoring to detect the presence of the SARS-CoV-2 virus in populations during the COVID-19 pandemic.[3][4][5] In one study, wastewater surveillance showed signs of SARS-CoV-2 RNA before any cases were detected in the local population.[6]

Later in the pandemic, wastewater surveillance was demonstrated to be one technique to detect SARS-CoV-2 variants[7] and to monitor their spread in regions for studying related ongoing infection dynamics.[8][9][10] Comparison between case based epidemiological records and deep-sequenced wastewater samples validated that the composition of the virus population in the wastewater is in strong agreement with the virus variants circulating in the infected population.[11] Following the 2022-23 reopening surge of COVID-19 cases in China, airplane wastewater surveillance began to be employed as a less intrusive method of monitoring for potential variants of concern arising within specific countries and regions.[12]

At the request of the US Centers for Disease Control, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine revealed, in a January 2023 report, its vision for a national wastewater surveillance system. Such a system would, according to the report committee, remove geographical inequities in the identification of future SARS-CoV-2 variants, influenza strains, antibiotic resistant bacteria, and other potential threats. Nationwide wastewater surveillance would likewise be combined with wastewater collection at other early-warning "sentinel sites," such as zoos and international airports.[13]