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. 2024 Nov-Dec;139(6):699-707.
doi: 10.1177/00333549241236644. Epub 2024 Apr 1.

Wastewater Surveillance of US Coast Guard Installations and Seagoing Military Vessels to Mitigate the Risk of COVID-19 Outbreaks, March 2021-August 2022

Gregory J Hall  1 , Eric J Page  2 , Min Rhee  1 , Clara Hay  1 , Amelia Krause  1 , Emma Langenbacher  1 , Allison Ruth  1 , Steve Grenier  3 , Alexander P Duran  4 , Ibrahim Kamara  5 , John K Iskander  6 , Fahad Alsayyid  7 , Dana L Thomas  8 , Edward Bock  9 , Nicholas Porta  9 , Jessica Pharo  9 , Beth A Osterink  9 , Sharon Zelmanowitz  3 , Corinna M Fleischmann  3 , Dilhara Liyanage  1 , Joshua P Gray  1
Affiliations

Wastewater Surveillance of US Coast Guard Installations and Seagoing Military Vessels to Mitigate the Risk of COVID-19 Outbreaks, March 2021-August 2022

Gregory J Hall et al. Public Health Rep. 2024 Nov-Dec.

Abstract

Objectives: Military training centers and seagoing vessels are often environments at high risk for the spread of COVID-19 and other contagious diseases, because military trainees and personnel arrive after traveling from many parts of the country and live in congregate settings. We examined whether levels of SARS-CoV-2 genetic material in wastewater correlated with SARS-CoV-2 infections among military personnel living in communal barracks and vessels at US Coast Guard training centers in the United States.

Methods: The Coast Guard developed and established 3 laboratories with wastewater testing capability at Coast Guard training centers from March 2021 through August 2022. We analyzed wastewater from barracks housing trainees and from 4 Coast Guard vessels for the presence of SARS-CoV-2 genes N and E and quantified the results relative to levels of a fecal indicator virus, pepper mild mottle virus. We compared quantified data with the timing of medically diagnosed COVID-19 infection among (1) military personnel who had presented with symptoms or had been discovered through contact tracing and had medical tests and (2) military personnel who had been discovered through routine surveillance by positive SARS-CoV-2 antigen or polymerase chain reaction test results.

Results: Levels of viral genes in wastewater at Coast Guard locations were best correlated with diagnosed COVID-19 cases when wastewater testing was performed twice weekly with passive samplers deployed for the entire week; such testing detected ≥1 COVID-19 case 69.8% of the time and ≥3 cases 88.3% of the time. Wastewater assessment in vessels did not continue because of logistical constraints.

Conclusion: Wastewater testing is an effective tool for measuring the presence and patterns of SARS-CoV-2 infections among military populations. Success with wastewater testing for SARS-CoV-2 infections suggests that other diseases may be assessed with similar approaches.

Keywords: SARS-CoV-2; communicable diseases; military; occupational health; public health practice; testing; wastewater; water; workforce.

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Conflict of interest statement

Declaration of Conflicting InterestsThe authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Update of

  • doi: 10.1101/2022.02.05.22269021

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