New wastewater surveillance method could provide an early warning of the next COVID-19 variant

Embargoed until: Publicly released: 2022-07-19 01:00

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Austrian scientists have developed a new method of analysing wastewater that can tell us which COVID-19 variants are present and how abundant they are. Previous methods of wastewater sampling were unable to achieve this, they say. The team analysed 3,413 wastewater samples representing 94 areas in Austria, covering nearly two-thirds of the population, and compared them with around 300,000 individual case reports to confirm their findings. Their new system, called VaQuERo (variant quantification in sewage pipeline designed for robustness), allowed them to deduce the abundance of COVID-19 variants in space and time. They also found that as the Delta variant emerged in Austria, viral genetic diversity detected in wastewater increased, suggesting the method could be used to predict the emergence of new COVID-19 variants.

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Journal/
conference: Nature Biotechnology

Research:Paper

Organisation/s: Medical University of Vienna, Austria

Funder: This project was funded in part by the Förderkreis 1669 der Universität Innsbruck, the FFG-Corona-emergency-call, the Austrian Agency for Health and Food Safety (AGES), the Vienna science and Technology Fund (WWTF) as part of the WWTF COVID-19 Rapid Response Funding 2020 (A.B.), the Austrian Science Fund (FWF1212P) and the Austrian Academy of Sciences. Z.K. was supported by a fellowship of the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA) Innovative Training Network H2020-MSCA- ITN-2019 (grant agreement no. 813343). Access to WWTP and sample logistics was possible through the Coron-A Project (funded by the Austrian Federal Ministry of Education, Science and Research, the Austrian Federal Ministry of Agriculture, Regions and Tourism, the Provincial Governments of Lower Austria, Upper Austria, Salzburg, Carinthia, Tyrol, Styria, Burgenland, Vorarlberg and the Austrian Association of Cities and Towns) and the national WW surveillance programmes conducted by the Austrian Federal Ministry of Education, Science and Research and by the Austrian Federal Ministry of Social Affairs, Health, Care and Consumer Protection. Additional samples and background information were provided by the COVID-19 WW surveillance programmes of the federal states of Carinthia, Vorarlberg

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