ArticleScientific reports2022
Assessment of a mass balance equation for estimating community-level prevalence of COVID-19 using wastewater-based epidemiology in a mid-sized city.
Article in Scientific reports, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 4 papers.
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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
4 citing papers in PubMed, 6 citations in OpenAlex.
- A Wastewater-based Modeling Framework for Inferring Norovirus Transmission Dynamics.Environmental science & technology · 2026Article
- A framework for evaluating implementation, impact, and cost-effectiveness of wastewater and environmental surveillance.Frontiers in public health · 2026Review
- Evaluating small extracellular vesicle-based vaccination across heterologousInfection and immunity · 2025Article
- The value of environmental surveillance for pandemic response.Scientific reports · 2024Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
10 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
Wastewater-based epidemiology (WBE) has emerged as a valuable epidemiologic tool to detect the presence of pathogens and track disease trends within a community. WBE overcomes some limitations of traditional clinical disease surveillance as it uses pooled samples from the entire community, irrespective of health-seeking behaviors and symptomatic status of infected individuals. WBE has the potential to estimate the number of infections within a community by using a mass balance equation, however, it has yet to be assessed for accuracy. We hypothesized that the mass balance equation-based approach using measured SARS-CoV-2 wastewater concentrations can generate accurate prevalence estimates of COVID-19 within a community. This study encompassed wastewater sampling over a 53-week period during the COVID-19 pandemic in Gainesville, Florida, to assess the ability of the mass balance equation to generate accurate COVID-19 prevalence estimates. The SARS-CoV-2 wastewater concentration showed a significant linear association (Parameter estimate = 39.43, P value < 0.0001) with clinically reported COVID-19 cases. Overall, the mass balance equation produced accurate COVID-19 prevalence estimates with a median absolute error of 1.28%, as compared to the clinical reference group. Therefore, the mass balance equation applied to WBE is an effective tool for generating accurate community-level prevalence estimates of COVID-19 to improve community surveillance.
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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.