Researchers are looking at wastewater to measure how prevalent SARS-CoV-2 is in a given community, according to an article on the STAT website.
Researchers collected samples in late March from a wastewater treatment plant serving a large metropolitan area in Massachusetts and found that the amount of SARS-CoV-2 particles in the sewage samples indicated a far higher number of people likely infected with Covid-19 than the reported cases in that area.
The study estimated that there were at least 2,300 people infected with Covid-19 in the area around the treatment facility. But at the time of analysis, which has not yet been peer-reviewed, there were 446 cases officially reported in that area.
Researchers in the Netherlands similarly described detecting the novel coronavirus in sewage samples — sometimes even before public health officials reported the first diagnosed case of Covid-19 in a given community.
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