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- Earlier this month, a report in the Journal of the American Medical Association noted that SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, can be detected live in feces, meaning it can be transmitted through fecal matter.
- Biobot, a wastewater analytics company, says it will begin analyzing sewage samples from across the U.S.
- To help track the spread of COVID-19, the startup wants to create a map of sewage systems that have poop testing positive.
In the U.S., COVID-19 (coronavirus) testing is woefully infrequent, making it much more difficult to track community spread. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) along with public health laboratories have only administered about 54,000 tests since the outbreak arrived stateside in January. By comparison, South Korea can complete 10,000 COVID-19 tests in one day.
Researchers from MIT’s wastewater analytics spinout Biobot, Harvard University, and Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston have come up with a different way to identify cases of COVID-19. They’ve launched a pro bono program to test community sewers. They’ll be looking for SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, in people’s poop.
It’s not a gimmick. Earlier this month, three researchers from China found that SARS-CoV-2 really can be found live in fecal matter, making it possible to transmit the virus through sewage systems. They published their findings in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
“We are establishing protocols to test sewage for SARS-CoV-2. If successful, this data will give communities a dynamic map of the virus as it spreads to new places,” Biobot notes on its website. The team is made up of biologists, epidemiologists, data scientists, urban planners, and engineers.
Sewage data will be able to assist with the following, according to Biobot:
- Measure the scope of the outbreak independent from patient testing or hospital reporting, and include data on asymptomatic individuals.
- Provide decision support for officials determining the timing and severity of public health interventions to mitigate the overall spread of the disease.
- Better anticipate likely impact on hospital capacity in order to inform hospital readiness and the necessity of public health interventions.
- Track the effectiveness of interventions and measure the wind-down period of the outbreak.
- Provide an early warning for reemergence of the coronavirus (if it does indeed have a seasonal cycle).
Here’s how it will work: First, Biobot will ship a sampling kit and sample collection protocols to sewage facilities. Those plants will collect 24-hour composite samples, meaning the samples were taken at regular intervals over a 24-hour span. Sewage plants send the samples back to Biobot, where they are processed.
Next, the researchers apply an RT-PCR protocol. This stands for reverse transcription and polymerase chain reaction, and it’s the same method used in U.S. COVID-19 tests. Finally, Biobot will communicate the test results back to the relevant municipalities.
All of the work is pro bono, but Biobot asks communities to cover the costs of the sampling kit, plus shipping, which comes to about $120. The company recommends collecting one or two samples each week. If these fees aren’t feasible, though, your community can contact Biobot to apply for support from the company’s partners.
Get Your Community Tested
First, identify the wastewater facilities that serve your community. They should have access to a 24-hour composite sampling device for the testing.
If you represent a government or municipality, you can then proceed to order a sampling kit from this page (fill out the form at the top). If you’re a concerned citizen and would like your local government to test its wastewater facilities, you should also fill out the form so a member of the Biobot team can help you encourage your community to send in samples.
Biobot will then send a sampling kit and instructions out to the wastewater facilities. Everything required to transport one sewage kit is included. The expected turnaround time should be about three days.
Program enrollment is currently live, and Biobot will be sending out sampling kits starting March 23. Research and development will begin at Biobot, MIT, and Harvard to figure out how to incorporate the incoming sewage data into a set of forecast models.
