No abstract

Rigorous testing is the way forward to fight the COVID-19 pandemic. Here we show that the currently used and most reliable RT-PCR based SARS-CoV-2 procedure can be further simplified to make it faster, safer, and economical by eliminating the RNA isolation step. The modified method is not only fast and convenient but also at par with the traditional method in terms of accuracy, and therefore, can be used for mass screening. Our method takes about half the time and is cheaper by about 40% compared to the currently used method. We also provide a variant of the new method that increases the efficiency of detection by about 30% compared to the existing procedure. Taken together, we demonstrate a more effective and reliable method of SARS-CoV-2 detection.

SARS-CoV-2 pandemic is having a devastating effect on human lives. Individuals who are symptomatic/asymptomatic or have recovered are reported to have/will have serious health complications in the future, which is going to be huge economic burden globally. Given the wide-spread transmission of SARS-CoV-2 it is almost impossible to test each and every individual for the same and isolate them. Recent reports have shown that sewage can be used as a holistic approach to estimate the epidemiology of the virus. Here we have estimated the spread of SARS-CoV-2 in the city of Hyderabad, India which is populated with nearly 10 million people. The sewage samples were collected from all the major sewage treatment plants (STPs) and were processed for detecting the viral genome using the standard RT-PCR method. Based on the average viral particle shedding per individual, the total number of individuals exposed to SARS-CoV-2 (in a window of 35 days) is about 6.6% of the population, which clearly indicates the rate of community transmission and asymptomatic carriers is higher than the number of reported cases. It is important to note here that the samples collected from the inlet of STPs were positive for SARS-CoV-2, while the outlets were negative indicating the efficient treatment of sewage at STPs. These studies are going to be essential to manage the pandemic better and also to assess the effectiveness of control measure.