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Review
. 2022 Jun:81:103840.
doi: 10.1016/j.scs.2022.103840. Epub 2022 Mar 16.

Dynamics of SARS-CoV-2 spreading under the influence of environmental factors and strategies to tackle the pandemic: A systematic review

Zunaira Asif  1 , Zhi Chen  1 , Saverio Stranges  2   3 , Xin Zhao  4 , Rehan Sadiq  5 , Francisco Olea-Popelka  6 , Changhui Peng  7 , Fariborz Haghighat  1 , Tong Yu  8
Affiliations
Review

Dynamics of SARS-CoV-2 spreading under the influence of environmental factors and strategies to tackle the pandemic: A systematic review

Zunaira Asif et al. Sustain Cities Soc. 2022 Jun.

Abstract

COVID-19 is deemed as the most critical world health calamity of the 21st century, leading to dramatic life loss. There is a pressing need to understand the multi-stage dynamics, including transmission routes of the virus and environmental conditions due to the possibility of multiple waves of COVID-19 in the future. In this paper, a systematic examination of the literature is conducted associating the virus-laden-aerosol and transmission of these microparticles into the multimedia environment, including built environments. Particularly, this paper provides a critical review of state-of-the-art modelling tools apt for COVID-19 spread and transmission pathways. GIS-based, risk-based, and artificial intelligence-based tools are discussed for their application in the surveillance and forecasting of COVID-19. Primary environmental factors that act as simulators for the spread of the virus include meteorological variation, low air quality, pollen abundance, and spatial-temporal variation. However, the influence of these environmental factors on COVID-19 spread is still equivocal because of other non-pharmaceutical factors. The limitations of different modelling methods suggest the need for a multidisciplinary approach, including the 'One-Health' concept. Extended One-Health-based decision tools would assist policymakers in making informed decisions such as social gatherings, indoor environment improvement, and COVID-19 risk mitigation by adapting the control measurements.

Keywords: COVID-19; Environmental models; Multimedia environment; One-health; Risk assessment; Virus transmission.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

Figures

Fig 1
Fig. 1
Relevance of human, animal, and environment interaction to viral disease based on One-Health concept.
Fig 2
Fig. 2
SARS-CoV-2 transmission via airborne particles and multiple pathways to multimedia and the built environment. Note: Agent to host transmission and then host to host transmission: animal to human transmission (A), human to human transmission (B), human to animal transmission (C); virus-laden-aerosol deposit and transmission into various environments multimedia (D–G).
Fig 3
Fig. 3
SARS-CoV-2 genome copies (GC)/day in wastewater compared to COVID-19 cases per 100,000 population from October to December 2020 with the time interval of 7 days: (a) Price river water improvement district (WID) in Utah, (b) Salt Lake City water reclamation facility (WRF) (Utah department of environmental quality, 2021); (c) SARS-CoV-2 genome copies (GC)/day in wastewater compared to COVID-19 daily count cases for Pataskala wastewater treatment plant (WWTP), Licking County, Ohio (Ohio Department of Health, 2021); (d) Normalized SARS-CoV-2 GC compared to daily counts of positive cases for Ottawa wastewater (Ottawa COVID-19, 2021). Notes. *Normalized copies: In wastewater, the proportion is from human waste, and the other proportion is from rainwater, snowmelt, etc. Viral copy data is normalized to subtract the runoff data using a seasonally stable faecal biomarker.
Fig 4
Fig. 4
Thematic aspects of various modelling techniques, their objectives, and outcomes to combat COVID-19 by incorporating environmental factors.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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