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Sewage May Be Essential to Spotting Next COVID-19 Outbreak

Matt Dibble

   BERKELEY, CALIF. - Health officials are looking at an unlikely source
   for early signs of a COVID-19 outbreak in their communities.

   Sewage.

   Data about the coronavirus found in sewage can warn of an outbreak up
   to seven days before clinical testing shows signs of a spike, say
   wastewater epidemiologists. That can give public health workers time to
   get ready -- prepare hospitals, ramp up closures and take other
   measures.

   "You're seeing it in sewage before people are really showing the
   symptoms, days and weeks before," said Eileen White, director of
   wastewater for EBMUD, a utility that serves 685,000 households in San
   Francisco's East Bay area.

   Since the pandemic began, the field of wastewater epidemiology, which
   tracked polio and Ebola viruses, has grown rapidly in response. An
   international alliance of more than 400 researchers is collaborating to
   share findings and methods, in an attempt to bring the most accurate
   information about the disease's spread to leaders.

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