First environmental surveillance for the presence of SARS-CoV-2 RNA in wastewater and river water in Japan
View ORCID ProfileEiji Haramoto, Bikash Malla, View ORCID ProfileOcean Thakali, View ORCID ProfileMasaaki Kitajima
doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.06.04.20122747
Abstract
Wastewater-based epidemiology can be a powerful tool to understand the actual incidence of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) in a community because severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), the etiological agent of COVID-19, can be shed in the feces of infected individuals regardless of their symptoms. The present study aimed to assess the presence of SARS-CoV-2 RNA in wastewater and river water in Yamanashi Prefecture, Japan, using four quantitative and two nested PCR assays. Influent and secondary-treated (before chlorination) wastewater samples and river water samples were collected five times from a wastewater treatment plant and three times from a river, respectively, between March 17 and May 7, 2020. The wastewater and river water samples (200-5,000 mL) were processed by using two different methods: the electronegative membrane-vortex (EMV) method and the membrane adsorption-direct RNA extraction method. Based on the observed concentrations of indigenous pepper mild mottle virus RNA, the EMV method was found superior to the membrane adsorption-direct RNA extraction method.
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