Cargando…

Wastewater Surveillance Can Function as an Early Warning System for COVID-19 in Low-Incidence Settings

Introduction: During the first two years of the COVID-19 pandemic, Australia implemented a series of international and interstate border restrictions. The state of Queensland experienced limited COVID-19 transmission and relied on lockdowns to stem any emerging COVID-19 outbreaks. However, early det...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Assoum, Mohamad, Lau, Colleen L., Thai, Phong K., Ahmed, Warish, Mueller, Jochen F., Thomas, Kevin V., Choi, Phil Min, Jackson, Greg, Selvey, Linda A.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10143724/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37104337
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/tropicalmed8040211
_version_ 1785033925139103744
author Assoum, Mohamad
Lau, Colleen L.
Thai, Phong K.
Ahmed, Warish
Mueller, Jochen F.
Thomas, Kevin V.
Choi, Phil Min
Jackson, Greg
Selvey, Linda A.
author_facet Assoum, Mohamad
Lau, Colleen L.
Thai, Phong K.
Ahmed, Warish
Mueller, Jochen F.
Thomas, Kevin V.
Choi, Phil Min
Jackson, Greg
Selvey, Linda A.
author_sort Assoum, Mohamad
collection PubMed
description Introduction: During the first two years of the COVID-19 pandemic, Australia implemented a series of international and interstate border restrictions. The state of Queensland experienced limited COVID-19 transmission and relied on lockdowns to stem any emerging COVID-19 outbreaks. However, early detection of new outbreaks was difficult. In this paper, we describe the wastewater surveillance program for SARS-CoV-2 in Queensland, Australia, and report two case studies in which we aimed to assess the potential for this program to provide early warning of new community transmission of COVID-19. Both case studies involved clusters of localised transmission, one originating in a Brisbane suburb (Brisbane Inner West) in July–August 2021, and the other originating in Cairns, North Queensland in February–March 2021. Materials and Methods: Publicly available COVID-19 case data derived from the notifiable conditions (NoCs) registry from the Queensland Health data portal were cleaned and merged spatially with the wastewater surveillance data using statistical area 2 (SA2) codes. The positive predictive value and negative predictive value of wastewater detection for predicting the presence of COVID-19 reported cases were calculated for the two case study sites. Results: Early warnings for local transmission of SARS-CoV-2 through wastewater surveillance were noted in both the Brisbane Inner West cluster and the Cairns cluster. The positive predictive value of wastewater detection for the presence of notified cases of COVID-19 in Brisbane Inner West and Cairns were 71.4% and 50%, respectively. The negative predictive value for Brisbane Inner West and Cairns were 94.7% and 100%, respectively. Conclusions: Our findings highlight the utility of wastewater surveillance as an early warning tool in low COVID-19 transmission settings.
format Online
Article
Text
id pubmed-10143724
institution National Center for Biotechnology Information
language English
publishDate 2023
publisher MDPI
record_format MEDLINE/PubMed
spelling pubmed-101437242023-04-29 Wastewater Surveillance Can Function as an Early Warning System for COVID-19 in Low-Incidence Settings Assoum, Mohamad Lau, Colleen L. Thai, Phong K. Ahmed, Warish Mueller, Jochen F. Thomas, Kevin V. Choi, Phil Min Jackson, Greg Selvey, Linda A. Trop Med Infect Dis Brief Report Introduction: During the first two years of the COVID-19 pandemic, Australia implemented a series of international and interstate border restrictions. The state of Queensland experienced limited COVID-19 transmission and relied on lockdowns to stem any emerging COVID-19 outbreaks. However, early detection of new outbreaks was difficult. In this paper, we describe the wastewater surveillance program for SARS-CoV-2 in Queensland, Australia, and report two case studies in which we aimed to assess the potential for this program to provide early warning of new community transmission of COVID-19. Both case studies involved clusters of localised transmission, one originating in a Brisbane suburb (Brisbane Inner West) in July–August 2021, and the other originating in Cairns, North Queensland in February–March 2021. Materials and Methods: Publicly available COVID-19 case data derived from the notifiable conditions (NoCs) registry from the Queensland Health data portal were cleaned and merged spatially with the wastewater surveillance data using statistical area 2 (SA2) codes. The positive predictive value and negative predictive value of wastewater detection for predicting the presence of COVID-19 reported cases were calculated for the two case study sites. Results: Early warnings for local transmission of SARS-CoV-2 through wastewater surveillance were noted in both the Brisbane Inner West cluster and the Cairns cluster. The positive predictive value of wastewater detection for the presence of notified cases of COVID-19 in Brisbane Inner West and Cairns were 71.4% and 50%, respectively. The negative predictive value for Brisbane Inner West and Cairns were 94.7% and 100%, respectively. Conclusions: Our findings highlight the utility of wastewater surveillance as an early warning tool in low COVID-19 transmission settings. MDPI 2023-03-31 /pmc/articles/PMC10143724/ /pubmed/37104337 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/tropicalmed8040211 Text en © 2023 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Brief Report
Assoum, Mohamad
Lau, Colleen L.
Thai, Phong K.
Ahmed, Warish
Mueller, Jochen F.
Thomas, Kevin V.
Choi, Phil Min
Jackson, Greg
Selvey, Linda A.
Wastewater Surveillance Can Function as an Early Warning System for COVID-19 in Low-Incidence Settings
title Wastewater Surveillance Can Function as an Early Warning System for COVID-19 in Low-Incidence Settings
title_full Wastewater Surveillance Can Function as an Early Warning System for COVID-19 in Low-Incidence Settings
title_fullStr Wastewater Surveillance Can Function as an Early Warning System for COVID-19 in Low-Incidence Settings
title_full_unstemmed Wastewater Surveillance Can Function as an Early Warning System for COVID-19 in Low-Incidence Settings
title_short Wastewater Surveillance Can Function as an Early Warning System for COVID-19 in Low-Incidence Settings
title_sort wastewater surveillance can function as an early warning system for covid-19 in low-incidence settings
topic Brief Report
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10143724/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37104337
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/tropicalmed8040211
work_keys_str_mv AT assoummohamad wastewatersurveillancecanfunctionasanearlywarningsystemforcovid19inlowincidencesettings
AT laucolleenl wastewatersurveillancecanfunctionasanearlywarningsystemforcovid19inlowincidencesettings
AT thaiphongk wastewatersurveillancecanfunctionasanearlywarningsystemforcovid19inlowincidencesettings
AT ahmedwarish wastewatersurveillancecanfunctionasanearlywarningsystemforcovid19inlowincidencesettings
AT muellerjochenf wastewatersurveillancecanfunctionasanearlywarningsystemforcovid19inlowincidencesettings
AT thomaskevinv wastewatersurveillancecanfunctionasanearlywarningsystemforcovid19inlowincidencesettings
AT choiphilmin wastewatersurveillancecanfunctionasanearlywarningsystemforcovid19inlowincidencesettings
AT jacksongreg wastewatersurveillancecanfunctionasanearlywarningsystemforcovid19inlowincidencesettings
AT selveylindaa wastewatersurveillancecanfunctionasanearlywarningsystemforcovid19inlowincidencesettings