A higher Italian health committee revealed that wastewater can be a substance to detect the spread of the new Corona virus.
The Higher Institute of Health (ISS) announced that a study conducted in Rome and Milan by a group led by Josepina La Rosa, from the Department of Water Quality and Health in the Environmental Management, to be published soon, confirmed this.
“The genetic material of the Sars-Cov-2 virus can be found in wastewater, which allows this type of sample from sewage to be used as an indication of an epidemic outbreak,” La Rosa said.
“During our research on viruses, we selected and analyzed a set of 8 wastewater samples collected between February 3 to 28 in Milan, and between March 31 to April 2 in Rome,” and that “in the two samples that were collected from the sewage system in The western and southeastern regions of Milan have confirmed the presence of the newly created RNA virus.
The health official stated that “For Rome, the same positive result was found in all samples taken in the eastern region of the city, and we are now expanding the search to include other wastewater samples from the sewage collection network in different regions, built over the years as part of a funded project From the National Center for Disease Prevention and Control of the Ministry of Health. ”
For his part, Luca Lucentini, director of the Water Quality and Health Department of the Higher Institute of Health, stressed that “our result does not represent a danger, but rather enhances the possibilities of using wastewater control in urban centers as a non-surgical tool for early detection of the spread of infection among the population.”
Italy is one of the countries that have suffered the most from the spread of Corona infection in Europe and the second country in the world in terms of the number of corona virus infections and deaths.
Source: “Aki”
