Feasibility assessment of an EU approach
The ability to detect SARS-CoV-2 in wastewater is a possible way to better understand its approximate overall presence in the population, if combined with the monitoring of suitable tracers such as cross-assembly phage, pepper mild mottle virus or chemicals tracers related to human activities (e.g. pharmaceuticals used in the treatment of COVID-19).
This report describes a fast track collaborative effort with stakeholders from academia, the Water and Public Health Sectors. The assessment reveals insights into methodologies and entailed costs for a European Sewage Sentinel System for SARS-CoV-2. Data from two experimental assessments link national, regional and local surveillance programs. It shares the findings of accompanying knowledge brokering and transfer events organized to have a rolling exchange of information and review of advances, such coping with the speed challenge of the rapid dynamics of this pandemic. Data from wastewater testing cannot replace existing COVID-19 surveillance systems, but complement them by providing:
• An efficient pooled community sample, since the virus is shed in the faeces of individuals with symptomatic or asymptomatic infection
• information on changes in total COVID-19 infection in the community connected to a sewer shed
• Data for communities where timely COVID-19 clinical testing is underutilized or unavailable.
• An early warning for (re)-emergence in Europe and beyond. Sewage testing has been successfully used as a method for early detection of other diseases, such as polio. Indeed, with the right frequency of testing, the tool can become a leading indicator of changes in COVID-19 burden in a community.
• a COVID-19 indicator that is independent of healthcare-seeking behaviours and access to clinical testing.
GAWLIK Bernd;
TAVAZZI Simona;
MARIANI Giulio;
SKEJO Helle;
SPONAR Michel;
HIGGINS Trudy;
MEDEMA Gertjan;
WINTGENS Thomas;
2021-04-29
Publications Office of the European Union
JRC125065
978-92-76-36888-5 (online),
978-92-76-36887-8 (print),
1831-9424 (online),
1018-5593 (print),
EUR 30684 EN,
OP KJ-NA-30684-EN-N (online),
OP KJ-NA-30684-EN-C (print),
https://publications.jrc.ec.europa.eu/repository/handle/JRC125065,
10.2760/300580 (online),
10.2760/909651 (print),
