Frontier review on the propensity and repercussion of SARS-CoV-2 migration to aquatic environment

Abstract

Increased concern has recently emerged pertaining to the occurrence of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) in aquatic environment during the current coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. While infectious SARS-CoV-2 has yet to be identified in the aquatic environment, the virus potentially enters the wastewater stream from patient excretions and a precautionary approach dictates evaluating transmission pathways to ensure public health and safety. Although enveloped viruses have presumed low persistence in water and are generally susceptible to inactivation by environmental stressors, previously identified enveloped viruses persist in the aqueous environment from days to several weeks. Our analysis suggests that not only the surface water, but also groundwater, represent SARS-CoV-2 control points through possible leaching and infiltrations of effluents from health care facilities, sewage, and drainage water. Most fecally transmitted viruses are highly persistent in the aquatic environment, and therefore, the persistence of SARS-CoV-2 in water is essential to inform its fate in water, wastewater and groundwater and subsequent human exposure.

Unravelling the early warning capability of wastewater surveillance for COVID-19: A temporal study on SARS-CoV-2 RNA detection and need for the escalation

“…Similarly, Randazzo et al (2020) detected SARS-CoV-2 RNA in wastewater samples from Spain. Since then, many researchers detected and reported the occurrence of SARS-CoV-2 RNA in wastewater samples and pondered its applicability for WBE surveillance ( Ahmed et al, 2020b , Ahmed et al, 2020a , Kumar et al 2020 a , b ). However, a few studies available focused on assessing its potential on the temporal scale in relation to the changes in COVID cases.…”

Unravelling the early warning capability of wastewater surveillance for COVID-19: A temporal study on SARS-CoV-2 RNA detection and need for the escalation

“…Similarly, Randazzo et al (2020) detected SARS-CoV-2 RNA in wastewater samples from Spain. Since then, many researchers detected and reported the occurrence of SARS-CoV-2 RNA in wastewater samples and pondered its applicability for WBE surveillance (Ahmed et al, 2020, Kumar et al 2020a,b). However, a few studies available focused on assessing its potential on the temporal scale in relation to the changes in COVID cases.…”

Several forms of SARS-CoV-2 RNA can be detected in wastewaters : implication for wastewater-based epidemiology and risk assessment

“…Accordingly high level of viral RNA have been detected in wastewaters in different countries and potential cases of transmission via wastewater have been reported (Yeo et al, 2020a;Yuan et al, 2020). In addition to the risk of exposure for sewage workers, wastewaters containing potentially infectious SARS-CoV-2 may enter the aquatic environment via wastewater discharge thus potentially resulting in pollution of surface waters (Kumar et al, 2020;Naddeo and Liu, 2020;Rimoldi et al, 2020;Wurtzer et al, 2020a)and to a lesser extent groundwaters. Such a pollution could locally affect the quality of water ressources used for the production of water intended to human consumption.…”