ReviewThe Science of the total environment2021
A critical review on SARS-CoV-2 infectivity in water and wastewater. What do we know?
Review in The Science of the total environment, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 67 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
67 citing papers in PubMed.
- Assessing Urban Ditches for Tracking SARS-CoV-2 in Low Sanitation Areas in Southeastern Brazil.Food and environmental virology · 2026Article
- Measuring SARS-CoV-2 RNA in Bangkok wastewater treatment plants and estimating infected population after fully opening the country in 2023, Thailand.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Wastewater Monitoring During the COVID-19 Pandemic in the Veneto Region, Italy: Longitudinal Observational Study.JMIR public health and surveillance · 2025Observational
- Evaluation of Three Viral Capsid Integrity qPCR Methods for Wastewater-Based Viral Surveillance.Food and environmental virology · 2025Article
- Evolution of SARS-CoV-2 in white-tailed deer in Pennsylvania 2021-2024.PLoS pathogens · 2025Article
- Lung infection in orally inoculated SARS-CoV-2 hamsters.PloS one · 2025Article
- Temporal dynamics of SARS-CoV-2 detection in wastewater and population infection trends in Mexico City.Frontiers in public health · 2025Article
- Flood-associated disease outbreaks and transmission in Southeast Asia.Frontiers in microbiology · 2025Review
- Article
- Near-source passive sampling for monitoring viral outbreaks within a university residential setting.Epidemiology and infection · 2024Article
- Sustainable removal of nutrients (n and p) in a wastewater treatment plant, with eggshell (biocalcium).Heliyon · 2023Article
- Enhanced detection of viruses for improved water safety.Scientific reports · 2023Article
- Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea Virus, Surrogate for Coronavirus Decay Measurement in French Coastal Waters and Contribution to Coronavirus Risk Evaluation.Microbiology spectrum · 2023Article
- SARS-CoV-2 in the environment: Contamination routes, detection methods, persistence and removal in wastewater treatment plants.The Science of the total environment · 2023Review
- Significance of wastewater surveillance in detecting the prevalence of SARS-CoV-2 variants and other respiratory viruses in the community - A multi-site evaluation.One health (Amsterdam, Netherlands) · 2023Article
- Comparative evaluation of advanced oxidation processes (AOPs) for reducing SARS-CoV-2 viral load from campus sewage water.Journal of environmental chemical engineering · 2023Article
- Water sector resilience in the United Kingdom and Ireland: The COVID-19 challenge.Utilities policy · 2023Article
- Review
- Genomic surveillance identifies potential risk factors for SARS-CoV-2 transmission at a mid-sized university in a small rural town.Scientific reports · 2023Article
- Tsunami-Driven Spread ofPathogens (Basel, Switzerland) · 2023Article
7 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
5 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
The COVID-19 outbreak circulating the world is far from being controlled, and possible contamination routes are still being studied. There are no confirmed cases yet, but little is known about the infection possibility via contact with sewage or contaminated water as well as with aerosols generated during the pumping and treatment of these aqueous matrices. Therefore, this article presents a literature review on the detection of SARS-CoV-2 in human excreta and its pathways through the sewer system and wastewater treatment plants until it reaches the water bodies, highlighting their occurrence and infectivity in sewage and natural water. Research lines are still indicated, which we believe are important for improving the detection, quantification, and mainly the infectivity analyzes of SARS-CoV-2 and other enveloped viruses in sewage and natural water. In fact, up till now, no case of transmission via contact with sewage or contaminated water has been reported and the few studies conducted with these aqueous matrices have not detected infectious viruses. On the other hand, studies are showing that SARS-CoV-2 can remain viable, i.e., infectious, for up to 4.3 and 6 days in sewage and water, respectively, and that other species of coronavirus may remain viable in these aqueous matrices for more than one year, depending on the sample conditions. These are strong pieces of evidence that the contamination mediated by contact with sewage or contaminated water cannot be ruled out, even because other more resistant and infectious mutations of SARS-CoV-2 may appear.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.