Citywide wastewater SARS-CoV-2 levels strongly correlated with multiple disease surveillance indicators and outcomes over three COVID-19 waves

Hopkins, Loren; Persse, David; Caton, Kelsey; Ensor, Katherine B.; Schneider, Rebecca; McCall, Camille; Stadler, Lauren B.

doi:10.1016/j.scitotenv.2022.158967

Cited by 31 publications

(35 citation statements)

References 44 publications

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“…The wastewater lead time lessened significantly during the Delta surge in both sewersheds and disappeared during the Omicron surge. This aligns with previous reports of reduced wastewater lead times after the Alpha surge [7,50].…”

Section: Resultssupporting

confidence: 92%

“…Future efforts could model these factors to come to a more accurate understanding of the ground truth case counts. Additional work could also incorporate hospitalization [7], vaccination, mobility and other data types that were not considered here. Importantly, modeling work should ensure that the case data used to train a predictive model are drawn from a period(s) when testing was adequate [23].…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This ratio should be representative of shedding per person assuming perfect diagnostic testing and accurate wastewater data (not accounting for SARS-CoV-2 RNA decay in the sewer). Log-scaling reduces extreme values in the datasets and mimics a linear relationship between the variables, as they are not normally distributed [7]. Several studies have proposed using this ratio for analysis, and have reported values between 0.24 and 0.39, or up to 0.67 after flow normalization [28][29][30][31].…”

Section: Correlation and The Ratio Between Wastewater And Case Datamentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The COVID-19 pandemic stimulated worldwide research on how wastewater-based surveillance of SARS-CoV-2 RNA can be used to monitor infections at the population level. Many studies have found strong correlations between SARS-CoV-2 wastewater RNA samples and COVID-19 cases via diagnostic testing [1][2][3][4], and routine wastewater surveillance has supported decision-makers in choosing appropriate public health responses [5][6][7]. With the widespread availability of at-home tests and decreased severity of disease due to vaccination and/or prior infection, the reliability of reported case data has decreased substantially since December 2021 [8].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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The dynamic relationship between COVID-19 cases and SARS-CoV-2 wastewater concentrations across time and space: considerations for model training data sets

Schill

Nelson

Harris-Lovett

et al. 2022

Preprint

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During the COVID-19 pandemic, wastewater-based surveillance has been used alongside diagnostic testing to monitor infection rates. With the decline in cases reported to public health departments due to at-home testing, wastewater data may serve as the primary input for epidemiological models, but training these models is not straightforward. We explored factors affecting noise and bias in the ratio between wastewater and case data collected in 26 sewersheds in California from October 2020 to March 2022. The strength of the relationship between wastewater and case data appeared dependent on sampling frequency and population size, but was not increased by wastewater normalization to flow rate or case count normalization to testing rates. Additionally, the lead and lag times between wastewater and case data varied over time and space, and the ratio of log-transformed individual cases to wastewater concentrations changed over time. This ratio increased sequentially in the Epsilon/Alpha, Delta, and Omicron BA.1 variant surges of COVID-19 and was also related to the diagnostic testing rate. Based on this analysis, we present a framework of scenarios describing the dynamics of the case to wastewater ratio to aid in data handling decisions for ongoing modeling efforts.

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Section: Resultssupporting

confidence: 92%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Correlation and The Ratio Between Wastewater And Case Datamentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 2 more Smart Citations

The dynamic relationship between COVID-19 cases and SARS-CoV-2 wastewater concentrations across time and space: considerations for model training data sets

Schill

Nelson

Harris-Lovett

et al. 2022

Preprint

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show abstract

“…The agreement between clinical and wastewater data, especially that observed during the Omicron wave, validates the ability to monitor proportions of VOCs circulating in communities from data collected in wastewater [35,10,36]. The WBE estimates can also provide an opportunity to better triangulate VOC proportions in locations where fewer clinical samples have been available, such as Newfoundland and Labrador (Figure 1, where larger uncertainty from clinical data is indicated by the widths of confidence intervals).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 63%

Emergence and Spread of SARS-CoV-2 Variants of Concern in Canada: a Retrospective Analysis from Clinical and Wastewater Data

Champredon

Becker

Peterson

et al. 2022

Preprint

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The spread of SARS-CoV-2 has been studied at unprecedented levels worldwide. In jurisdictions where molecular analysis was performed on large scales, the emergence and competition of numerous SARS-CoV-2 lineages has been observed in near real-time. Lineage identification, traditionally performed from clinical samples, can also be determined by sampling wastewater from sewersheds serving populations of interest. Of particular interest are variants of concern (VOCs), SARS-CoV-2 lineages that are associated with increased transmissibility and/or severity. Here, we consider clinical and wastewater data sources to retrospectively assess the emergence and spread of different VOCs in Canada. We show that, overall, wastewater-based VOC identification provides similar insights to the surveillance based on clinical samples. Based on clinical data, we observed a synchrony in VOC introduction as well as similar emergence speeds across most Canadian provinces despite the large geographical size of the country and differences in provincial public health measures. In particular, it took approximately four months for VOC Alpha and Delta to contribute to half of the incidence, whereas VOC Omicron achieved the same contribution in less than one month. By quantifying the timing and rapidity of SARS-CoV-2 VOCs invasion in Canada, this study provides important benchmarks to support preparedness for future VOCs, and to some extent, for future pandemics caused by other pathogens.

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Identifying spatiotemporal trends of SARS-CoV-2 RNA in wastewater: from the perspective of upstream and downstream wastewater-based epidemiology (WBE)

Tran,

You,

Liu

et al. 2024

Environ Sci Pollut Res

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Recently, many efforts have been made to address the rapid spread of newly identi ed COVID-19 virus variants . Wastewater-based epidemiology (WBE) is considered as a potential early warning tool for identifying the rapid spread of this virus. This study investigated the occurrence of SARS-CoV-2 in eight wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) and their sewerage systems which serve most of the population in Taoyuan City, Taiwan. Across the entire study period, the wastewater viral concentrations were correlated with the number of COVID-19 cases in each WWTP (Spearman' r = 0.23 -0.76). In addition, it is con rmed that several treatment technologies could effectively eliminate the virus RNA from WWTPs in uent (> 90 %). On the other hand, further results revealed that an inverse distance weighted (IDW) interpolation and hot spot model combined with geographic information system (GIS) method could be applied to analyze the spatiotemporal variations of SARS-CoV-2 in wastewater from sewer system. In addition, socioeconomic factors namely population density, land-use, and tax-income were successfully identi ed as the potentials drivers which substantially affect the onset of COVID-19 outbreak in Taiwan. Finally, the data obtained from this study can provide a powerful tool in public health decision-making not only in response to the current epidemic situation but also other epidemic issues in the future.

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Citywide wastewater SARS-CoV-2 levels strongly correlated with multiple disease surveillance indicators and outcomes over three COVID-19 waves

Cited by 31 publications

References 44 publications

The dynamic relationship between COVID-19 cases and SARS-CoV-2 wastewater concentrations across time and space: considerations for model training data sets

The dynamic relationship between COVID-19 cases and SARS-CoV-2 wastewater concentrations across time and space: considerations for model training data sets

Emergence and Spread of SARS-CoV-2 Variants of Concern in Canada: a Retrospective Analysis from Clinical and Wastewater Data

Identifying spatiotemporal trends of SARS-CoV-2 RNA in wastewater: from the perspective of upstream and downstream wastewater-based epidemiology (WBE)

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