Novel coronavirus found in surprisingly high levels in sewage

Because SARS-CoV-2, the novel coronavirus that causes COVID-19, has been found in the feces of confirmed COVID-19 patients, wastewater-based epidemiology might be an effective way to track the extent of the disease in a population. Wastewater epidemiology is most commonly used to monitor drug usage in a community. It can also provide information about the spread of infection when individual tests are limited. A team led by Eric J. Alm of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Biobot Analytics has now used quantitative reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) to measure SARS-CoV-2 in sewage from a wastewater treatment facility in Massachusetts (medRxiv 2020, DOI: 10.1101/2020.04.05.20051540).