Coronavirus pandemic | Researchers exploring sewage sample tests to detect COVID-19 cases

By conducting sewage sample tests, the experts would be able to map collection areas to narrow down on clusters where infected people live

Moneycontrol News

April 28, 2020 / 12:44 PM IST

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In a bid to adopt a method that would help conduct community surveillance for COVID-19 cases in a non-invasive way, a team of experts from the COVID Action Collab (CAC) is exploring ways to treat sewage water to detect traces of the pathogen.

In its official release, the CAC has informed that it has brought more than 150 experts from different walks of life under one roof to explore the feasibility of this method of community testing and ways to contain novel coronavirus spread in general.

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A Business Standard report states that the 150-member team includes wastewater treatment experts, sanitation experts, public health experts, microbiologists, virologists, and members of the National Institute of Urban Affairs. Commenting on the need to include experts from various disciplines, Dr Angela Chaudhuri, Health Strategy Partner, Catalyst Group, said: “This kind of a pioneering endeavour requires a multi-disciplinary approach.”

Experts believe that the metabolic waste of COVID-19 patients contain traces of the virus, which can be detected through special laboratory tests, even if the sample is collected from sewage in extremely diluted form. Building on this thought, the CAC team is trying to device a way to collect stool and urine sample of entire localities to find out if any infected person is residing there so that the authorities can take action accordingly.

COVID-19 Vaccine

Frequently Asked Questions

How does a vaccine work?

A vaccine works by mimicking a natural infection. A vaccine not only induces immune response to protect people from any future COVID-19 infection, but also helps quickly build herd immunity to put an end to the pandemic. Herd immunity occurs when a sufficient percentage of a population becomes immune to a disease, making the spread of disease from person to person unlikely. The good news is that SARS-CoV-2 virus has been fairly stable, which increases the viability of a vaccine.

How many types of vaccines are there?

There are broadly four types of vaccine — one, a vaccine based on the whole virus (this could be either inactivated, or an attenuated [weakened] virus vaccine); two, a non-replicating viral vector vaccine that uses a benign virus as vector that carries the antigen of SARS-CoV; three, nucleic-acid vaccines that have genetic material like DNA and RNA of antigens like spike protein given to a person, helping human cells decode genetic material and produce the vaccine; and four, protein subunit vaccine wherein the recombinant proteins of SARS-COV-2 along with an adjuvant (booster) is given as a vaccine.

What does it take to develop a vaccine of this kind?

Vaccine development is a long, complex process. Unlike drugs that are given to people with a diseased, vaccines are given to healthy people and also vulnerable sections such as children, pregnant women and the elderly. So rigorous tests are compulsory. History says that the fastest time it took to develop a vaccine is five years, but it usually takes double or sometimes triple that time.

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