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Published January 5, 2023 | public
Journal Article

Wastewater surveillance for public health

Abstract

Dating back to the origins of modern epidemiology, wastewater surveillance has predominantly been used to track pathogens spread by fecal-oral transmission such as those that cause cholera and polio. However, more than just these "enteric" pathogens are shed via the gut, as highlighted by the success of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) wastewater surveillance (1, 2), recent work on tracking influenza virus (3) and monkeypox virus (4), and observations of extensive pathogen diversity in stool (5, 6). Wastewater is now a core component of infectious disease monitoring, providing a variant-specific, community-representative picture of public health trends that captures previously undetected spread and pathogen transmission links. Building on recent laboratory and analytical advances to identify the diverse pathogens present in sewage will be essential to ongoing efforts to understand disease risks and will transform infectious disease surveillance.

Additional Information

The authors are supported by National Institutes of Health (NIH) National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases U01AI151812 (K.G.A), National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences UL1TR002550 (K.G.A), Centers for Disease Control and Prevention contracts 75D301-20-C-09795 (K.G.A., R.K.) and 75D301-22-R-72097 (K.G.A, R.K.), and NIH 5T32AI007244-38 (J.I.L.).

Additional details

Created:
August 22, 2023
Modified:
October 25, 2023