ArticleThe Science of the total environment2023
Passive swab versus grab sampling for detection of SARS-CoV-2 markers in wastewater.
Article in The Science of the total environment, 2023. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 6 papers.
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Who cites it
6 citing papers in PubMed.
- Detecting and supporting COVID-19 outbreak response in a small-scale nursing home through passive wastewater surveillance of SARS-CoV-2.Applied and environmental microbiology · 2026Article
- Passive sampling of hospital wastewater as a promising warning signal for Candidozyma auris in a low-prevalence setting: a proof-of-concept study.Antimicrobial resistance and infection control · 2026Article
- Environmental surveillance for Salmonella Typhi to detect the typhoid burden in Yogyakarta, Indonesia.International journal of hygiene and environmental health · 2025Article
- A Narrative Review of High Throughput Wastewater Sample Processing for Infectious Disease Surveillance: Challenges, Progress, and Future Opportunities.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2024Review
- Food and Environmental Virology: Use of Passive Sampling to Characterize the Presence of SARS-CoV-2 and Other Viruses in Wastewater.Food and environmental virology · 2024Article
- Longitudinal wastewater-based surveillance of SARS-CoV-2 during 2023 in Ethiopia.Frontiers in public health · 2024Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
8 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Early detection of the COVID-19 virus, SARS-CoV-2, is key to mitigating the spread of new outbreaks. Data from individual testing is increasingly difficult to obtain as people conduct non-reported home tests, defer tests due to logistics or attitudes, or ignore testing altogether. Wastewater based epidemiology is an alternative method for surveilling a community while maintaining individual anonymity; however, a problem is that SARS-CoV-2 markers in wastewater vary throughout the day. Collecting grab samples at a single time may miss marker presence, while autosampling throughout a day is technically challenging and expensive. This study investigates a passive sampling method that would be expected to accumulate greater amounts of viral material from sewers over a period of time. Tampons were tested as passive swab sampling devices from which viral markers could be eluted with a Tween-20 surfactant wash. Six sewersheds in Detroit were sampled 16-22 times by paired swab (4 h immersion before retrieval) and grab methods over a five-month period and enumerated for N1 and N2 SARS-CoV-2 markers using ddPCR. Swabs detected SARS-CoV-2 markers significantly more frequently (P < 0.001) than grab samples, averaging two to three-fold more copies of SARS-CoV-2 markers than their paired grab samples (p < 0.0001) in the assayed volume (10 mL) of wastewater or swab eluate. No significant difference was observed in the recovery of a spiked-in control (Phi6), indicating that the improved sensitivity is not due to improvements in nucleic acid recovery or reduction of PCR inhibition. The outcomes of swab-based sampling varied significantly between sites, with swab samples providing the greatest improvements in counts for smaller sewersheds that otherwise tend to have greater variation in grab sample counts. Swab-sampling with tampons provides significant advantages in detection of SARS-CoV-2 wastewater markers and are expected to provide earlier detection of new outbreaks than grab samples, with consequent public health benefits.
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