Sunday, January 24, 2021
Image: Noun Project CC
The Narragansett Bay Commission has been accepted to participate in a COVID-19 study conducted by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
The study is designed to quickly monitor 100 million people across the United States by monitoring wastewater to control the COVID-19 epidemic and identify best practices for the assessment of SARS-CoV-2 wastewater and subsequent data analyzes across the country.
Questions about the transmission of coronavirus through wastewater began in May 2020 when the World Health Organization began asking questions.
In October, MIT reported that the university began piloting a wastewater testing program as a new tool to help keep the campus community safe this semester.
“In a project that will take place during the fall semester, the wastewater from seven campus buildings will be tested daily to detect SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. The project is designed to determine whether the Wastewater testing can be an effective early warning system for COVID-19 outbreaks on campus and is being evaluated as a complementary tool in the Institute’s response to the pandemic, along with clinical testing, contacts and other measures, ”MIT reported.
Bullock Point Wastewater Treatment Plant, PHOTO: NBC
How many viruses are in the water
NBC’s Bucklin Point wastewater treatment plant in East Providence participates in phase I of the study, during which the influence of raw wastewater is tested twice a week for six weeks. . Phase I will assess 10% of the American population by controlling wastewater. Follow-up began on 27 December 2020.
The second phase will register additional treatment plants in order to accelerate the goal of monitoring 30% of the American population. HHS will collect all data and pass it on to communities, with the goal of returning the data as soon as possible so that local health departments can make quick and actionable decisions.
“Wastewater treatment has always been essential to public health, protecting our citizens from diseases and epidemics like dysentery and cholera,” said Vincent Mesolella, president of NBC. “It is a natural progression of our public health mission to contribute again to the fight against COVID. We are very proud to be part of this study by providing valuable data to our country’s leaders during this difficult time. ”
A paper published in Nature reports that “the health risks of COVID-19 through water transmission may be greater than initially assumed and wastewater should be studied as a potential route for COVID-19 transmission. of the presence of SARS-CoV-2 RNA from wastewater systems accumulates worldwide The large number of infected individuals in the current pandemic along with the high infectivity of SARS-CoV-2 could present a new challenge for wastewater treatment and calls for a future assessment of the risk of transmission through the reuse of wastewater.These risks could be expected to be higher in areas with high population density, direct exposure to aerosolized wastewater, as well as in regions that do not have adequate wastewater collection, treatment and disinfection. “
“There is an urgent need for extensive research into the frequency of detection of infectious SARS-CoV-2 in wastewater:
(1) critical information on virus abundance in raw wastewater, treated wastewater and the receiving environment, which can be used to generate a quantitative risk assessment;
(2) information on the efficiency of disposal through the wastewater treatment plant;
(3) disinfection requirements according to virus loading and transmission through WWTP to ensure complete elimination of SARS-CoV-2 for wastewater reuse; and (4) epidemic surveillance for policymakers on the outbreak, spread, and prevalence of the COVID-19 pandemic in the community, ”the report published in August wrote.
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