Analysis Insights to Support the Use of Wastewater and Environmental Surveillance Data for Infectious Diseases and Pandemic Preparedness
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In: Epidemics, Vol. 51, 100825, 01.06.2025.
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
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TY - JOUR
T1 - Analysis Insights to Support the Use of Wastewater and Environmental Surveillance Data for Infectious Diseases and Pandemic Preparedness
AU - O'Reilly, Kathrine
AU - Wade, Matthew
AU - Farkas, Kata
AU - Amman, Fabian
AU - Lison, Adrian
AU - Munday, James
AU - Bingham, Jeremy
AU - Mthombothi, Zinhle
AU - Fang, Z
AU - Brown, C
AU - Kao, Rowland
AU - Danon, L
PY - 2025/3/28
Y1 - 2025/3/28
N2 - Wastewater-based epidemiology is the detection of pathogens from sewage systems and the interpretation of these data to improve public health. Its use has increased in scope since 2020, when it was demonstrated that SARS-CoV-2 RNA could be successfully extracted from the wastewater of affected populations. In this Perspective we provide an overview of recent advances in pathogen detection within wastewater, propose a framework for identifying the utility of wastewater sampling for pathogen detection and suggest areas where analytics require development. Ensuring that both data collection and analysis are tailored towards key questions at different stages of an epidemic will improve the inference made. For analyses to be useful we require methods to determine the absence of infection, early detection of infection, reliably estimate epidemic trajectories and prevalence, and detect of novel variants without reliance on consensus sequences. This research area has included many innovations that have improved the interpretation of collected data and we are optimistic that innovation will continue in the future.
AB - Wastewater-based epidemiology is the detection of pathogens from sewage systems and the interpretation of these data to improve public health. Its use has increased in scope since 2020, when it was demonstrated that SARS-CoV-2 RNA could be successfully extracted from the wastewater of affected populations. In this Perspective we provide an overview of recent advances in pathogen detection within wastewater, propose a framework for identifying the utility of wastewater sampling for pathogen detection and suggest areas where analytics require development. Ensuring that both data collection and analysis are tailored towards key questions at different stages of an epidemic will improve the inference made. For analyses to be useful we require methods to determine the absence of infection, early detection of infection, reliably estimate epidemic trajectories and prevalence, and detect of novel variants without reliance on consensus sequences. This research area has included many innovations that have improved the interpretation of collected data and we are optimistic that innovation will continue in the future.
U2 - 10.1016/j.epidem.2025.100825
DO - 10.1016/j.epidem.2025.100825
M3 - Article
VL - 51
JO - Epidemics
JF - Epidemics
SN - 1755-4365
M1 - 100825
ER -