Wastewater surveillance in the Management of Covid 19: experiences from three Countries

Abstract

Webinar presented and hosted by the Academy of Science of South Africa (ASSAf) and the South African Medical Research Council (SAMRC) on 31 August 2021. Since the advent of the COVID-19 pandemic, wastewater surveillance for SARS-CoV-2 RNA has emerged to be an important tool in the management of the disease. The viral RNA can be isolated in wastewater around one to two weeks before it is usually detected through human testing at community level. Direct correlations have been found between the concentrations of SARS-CoV-2 RNA in wastewater and the number of cases of COVID-19 in a particular wastewater catchment area, providing the basis for a COVID-19 Early Warning System. Being relatively affordable and reliable, the tool appears to be particularly valuable in settings where epidemiological data are not available, to establish and adjust public health management strategies. In this webinar, the experiences, challenges encountered, and lessons learned in the course of rolling out wastewater surveillance programmes in the United Kingdom, South Africa and Nigeria are discussed, including preliminary information on the tracking of SARS-CoV-2 variants in wastewater.