The World Health Organisation (WHO) has stated that SARS-CoV-2, the COVID-19 virus, does not readily spread through sewage and wastewater systems. However, non-infectious genetic residues of the virus, not unlike other microbes, can remain in wastewater systems in the locations where infected people go to the toilet.

Scientists at Newcastle University, UK, and the University of Santiago de Compostela, Spain, working with water industry partners Northumbrian Water and Labaqua, part of the SUEZ corporation, are monitoring sewage from across networks in Spain and North East England to develop a way to estimate the prevalence of the COVID-19 virus across the regions.

Their new project, which has been funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Council (EPSRC), is being co-led by Professor David Graham, Professor of Ecosystems Engineering, and Dr Marcos Quintela Baluja both from Newcastle University, with their close colleague Professor Jesus Romalde in Santiago.

The work will not identify whether individual people are infected, but by monitoring sewage from different places across a region, the research team will be able to estimate local concentrations of the virus and potentially link levels back to human population numbers. This could help public health officials identify possible infection ‘hot spots’ and could be especially helpful in places where infected people do not show any symptoms.