Project R-14409

Wastewater-based Epidemiology: leveraging sewage water to mitigate clinical data biases (Research)

Epidemiologic models need accurate estimates of the daily number of newly infected people within the study area to provide us with reasonable scenarios. This information is usually obtained by leveraging clinical tests, for example in the case of COVID-19. Their lowering number, though, makes them a more and more unreliable source. Wastewater is a very promising alternative. Its main selling points are the low maintenance costs and the logistical efficiency of having to carry a limited number of extraction and analyses to obtain the raw data. The main sources of noise affecting the data are dilution and signal disgregation within the sewage pipes. Thanks to the SARI project, we have at our disposal weekly/bi-weekly extractions from 13 plants within the Tuscany region in Italy. The goal of this project is to demonstrate the feasibility of a wastewater-based epidemiology approach for the Tuscanian environment, particularly difficult due to the presence of mandatory septic tanks within civil buildings, which severely increase signal disgregation, and possibly other places. We plan to construct a pipeline to obtain polished data suitable for epidemiologic modeling and demonstrate the possibility to use the refined data to inform epidemiological models. To fully realize the potential of the wastewater tool, this framework aims to be generic both for different sewage networks and different health issues (e.g. flu, drug consumption and others).

19 December 2023 - 31 May 2025