Monitoring occurrence of SARS-CoV-2 in school populations: a wastewater-based approach

Victor Castro-Gutierrez; Francis Hassard; Milan Vu; Rodrigo Leitao; Beata Burczynska; Dirk Wildeboer; Isobelle Stanton; Shadi Rahimzadeh; Gianluca Baio; Hemda Garelick; Jan Hofman; Barbara Kasprzyk-Hordern; Rachel Kwiatkowska; Azeem Majeed; Sally Priest; Jasmine M S Grimsley; Lian Lundy; Andrew Singer; Mariachiara Di Cesare

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0270168

Monitoring occurrence of SARS-CoV-2 in school populations: a wastewater-based approach

Victor Castro-Gutierrez, Francis Hassard, Milan Vu, Rodrigo Leitao, Beata Burczynska, Dirk Wildeboer, Isobelle Stanton, Shadi Rahimzadeh, Gianluca Baio, Hemda Garelick, Jan Hofman, Barbara Kasprzyk-Hordern, Rachel Kwiatkowska, Azeem Majeed, Sally Priest, Jasmine M S Grimsley, Lian Lundy, Andrew Singer, Mariachiara Di Cesare

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Abstract

Clinical testing of children in schools is challenging, with economic implications limiting its frequent use as a monitoring tool of the risks assumed by children and staff during the COVID-19 pandemic. Here, a wastewater-based epidemiology approach has been used to monitor 16 schools (10 primary, 5 secondary and 1 post-16 and further education) in England. A total of 296 samples over 9 weeks have been analysed for N1 and E genes using qPCR methods. Of the samples returned, 47.3% were positive for one or both genes with a detection frequency in line with the respective local community. WBE offers a low cost, non-invasive approach for supplementing clinical testing and can provide longitudinal insights that are impractical with traditional clinical testing.

Original language	English
Article number	e0270168
Journal	PLoS ONE
Volume	17
Issue number	6 June
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0270168
Publication status	Published - 17 Jun 2022

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Castro-Gutierrez, V., Hassard, F., Vu, M., Leitao, R., Burczynska, B., Wildeboer, D., Stanton, I., Rahimzadeh, S., Baio, G., Garelick, H., Hofman, J., Kasprzyk-Hordern, B., Kwiatkowska, R., Majeed, A., Priest, S., Grimsley, J. M. S., Lundy, L., Singer, A., & Di Cesare, M. (2022). Monitoring occurrence of SARS-CoV-2 in school populations: a wastewater-based approach. PLoS ONE, 17(6 June), [e0270168]. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0270168

Castro-Gutierrez, V, Hassard, F, Vu, M, Leitao, R, Burczynska, B, Wildeboer, D, Stanton, I, Rahimzadeh, S, Baio, G, Garelick, H, Hofman, J , Kasprzyk-Hordern, B, Kwiatkowska, R, Majeed, A, Priest, S, Grimsley, JMS, Lundy, L, Singer, A & Di Cesare, M 2022, 'Monitoring occurrence of SARS-CoV-2 in school populations: a wastewater-based approach', PLoS ONE, vol. 17, no. 6 June, e0270168. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0270168

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AU - Wildeboer, Dirk

AU - Stanton, Isobelle

AU - Rahimzadeh, Shadi

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AU - Garelick, Hemda

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AU - Kasprzyk-Hordern, Barbara

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Monitoring occurrence of SARS-CoV-2 in school populations: a wastewater-based approach

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