Digital technologies are being harnessed to support the public-health response to COVID-19 worldwide, including population surveillance, case identification, contact tracing and evaluation of interventions on the basis of mobility data and communication with the public. These rapid responses leverage billions of mobile phones, large online datasets, connected devices, relatively low-cost computing resources and advances in machine learning and natural language processing. This Review aims to capture the breadth of digital innovations for the public-health response to COVID-19 worldwide and their limitations, and barriers to their implementation, including legal, ethical and privacy barriers, as well as organizational and workforce barriers. The future of public health is likely to become increasingly digital, and we review the need for the alignment of international strategies for the regulation, evaluation and use of digital technologies to strengthen pandemic management, and future preparedness for COVID-19 and other infectious diseases.

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Digital technologies in the public-health response to COVID-19.

Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) RNA is frequently detected in the feces of infected individuals. While infectious SARS-CoV-2 has not previously been identified in waste...

Persistence of SARS-CoV-2 in Water and Wastewater

Decay of SARS-CoV-2 and surrogate murine hepatitis virus RNA in untreated wastewater to inform application in wastewater-based epidemiology.

Implementation of environmental surveillance for SARS-CoV-2 virus to support public health decisions: opportunities and challenges.

COVID-19 is an ongoing global pandemic caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). As of July 29th 2020, more than 16,6 million cases have been reported in more than 188 countries/territories, leading to more than 659000 deaths. One of the main challenges facing health authorities has been testing for the virus on a sufficiently comprehensive scale. The pandemic has been an impetus for the wastewater community as it has inspired scientists to look to wastewater to help fill in the gap of measuring the prevalence of SARS-CoV-2 within a given community. Testing the wastewater may serve as an early warning system allowing timely interventions. Although viral shedding varies among individuals and over the course of their infection, the sewage system can blend these variations into an average that represents the wider studied community. The urgent need has led to a lack of coherent reporting of data regarding the analysis, as these huge and remarkable efforts by the wastewater scientific community were made in a very short time. Important information on the analytical approach is often lacking, while there is still no optimisation of the methodology, including sampling, sample storage and concentration, RNA extraction and detection/quantification. This review aims at identifying the main issues for consideration, relating to the development of validated methodological protocols for the virus quantitative analysis in wastewater. Their inclusion will enable the methodological optimisation of SARS-CoV-2 wastewater analyses, transforming the wastewater infrastructure into a source of useful information for the health sector.

Sewage analysis as a tool for the COVID-19 pandemic response and management: the urgent need for optimised protocols for SARS-CoV-2 detection and quantification

BACKGROUND: Wastewater-based epidemiology (WBE) for severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) can be an important source of information for coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) management during and after the pandemic. Currently, governments and transportation industries around the world are developing strategies to minimize SARS-CoV-2 transmission associated with resuming activity. This study investigated the possible use of SARS-CoV-2 RNA wastewater surveillance from airline and cruise ship sanitation systems and its potential use as a COVID-19 public health management tool. METHODS: Aircraft and cruise ship wastewater samples (n = 21) were tested for SARS-CoV-2 using two virus concentration methods, adsorption-extraction by electronegative membrane (n = 13) and ultrafiltration by Amicon (n = 8), and five assays using reverse-transcription quantitative polymerase chain reaction (RT-qPCR) and RT-droplet digital PCR (RT-ddPCR). Representative qPCR amplicons from positive samples were sequenced to confirm assay specificity. RESULTS: SARS-CoV-2 RNA was detected in samples from both aircraft and cruise ship wastewater; however concentrations were near the assay limit of detection. The analysis of multiple replicate samples and use of multiple RT-qPCR and/or RT-ddPCR assays increased detection sensitivity and minimized false-negative results. Representative qPCR amplicons were confirmed for the correct PCR product by sequencing. However, differences in sensitivity were observed among molecular assays and concentration methods. CONCLUSIONS: The study indicates that surveillance of wastewater from large transport vessels with their own sanitation systems has potential as a complementary data source to prioritize clinical testing and contact tracing among disembarking passengers. Importantly, sampling methods and molecular assays must be further optimized to maximize detection sensitivity. The potential for false negatives by both wastewater testing and clinical swab testing suggests that the two strategies could be employed together to maximize the probability of detecting SARS-CoV-2 infections amongst passengers.

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Detection of SARS-CoV-2 RNA in commercial passenger aircraft and cruise ship wastewater: a surveillance tool for assessing the presence of COVID-19 infected travellers.

Homa Teimouri Sichani

Papers

Detection of SARS-CoV-2 RNA in commercial passenger aircraft and cruise ship wastewater: a surveillance tool for assessing the presence of COVID-19 infected travellers.

Toxic effects of individual and combined effects of BTEX on Euglena gracilis.

Assessing benzene-induced toxicity on wild type Euglena gracilis Z and its mutant strain SMZ