Wang Hao, Churqui Marianela Patzi, Tunovic Timur, Enache Lucica, Johansson Anette, Kärmander Ambjörn, Nilsson Staffan, Lagging Martin, Andersson Maria, Dotevall Leif, Brezicka Thomas, Nyström Kristina, Norder Heléne
Institute of Biomedicine, Department of Infectious Diseases, University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden.
Sahlgrenska University Hospital, Department of Clinical Microbiology, Region Västra Götaland, Gothenburg, Sweden.
iScience. 2022 Sep 16;25(9):105000. doi: 10.1016/j.isci.2022.105000. Epub 2022 Aug 24.
Virus surveillance in wastewater can be a useful indicator of the development of the COVID-19 pandemic in communities. However, knowledge about how the amount of SARS-CoV-2 RNA in wastewater relates to different data on the burden on the health system is still limited. Herein, we monitored the amount of SARS-CoV-2 RNA and the spectrum of virus variants in weekly pooled wastewater samples for two years from mid-February 2020 and compared them with several clinical data. The two-year monitoring showed the weekly changes in the amount of viral RNA in wastewater preceded the hospital care needs for COVID-19 and the number of acute calls on adult acute respiratory distress by 1-2 weeks during the first three waves of COVID-19. Our study demonstrates that virus surveillance in wastewater can predict the development of a pandemic and its burden on the health system, regardless of society's test capacity and possibility of tracking infected cases.
废水中的病毒监测可以作为社区中新冠疫情发展的一个有用指标。然而，关于废水中严重急性呼吸综合征冠状病毒2（SARS-CoV-2）RNA数量与卫生系统负担的不同数据之间的关系，我们所知仍然有限。在此，我们从2020年2月中旬开始，对每周采集的混合废水样本中的SARS-CoV-2 RNA数量和病毒变体谱进行了为期两年的监测，并将其与多项临床数据进行了比较。为期两年的监测显示，在新冠疫情的前三波中，废水中病毒RNA数量的每周变化比新冠疫情的医院护理需求以及成人急性呼吸窘迫急诊呼叫数量提前1至2周。我们的研究表明，无论社会的检测能力和追踪感染病例的可能性如何，废水中的病毒监测都可以预测疫情的发展及其对卫生系统的负担。
