ABSTRACT
SARS-CoV-2 is a respiratory virus but it is also detected in a significant proportion of fecal samples of COVID-19 cases. Recent studies have shown that wastewater surveillance can be a low-cost tool for management of COVID-19 pandemic and tracking COVID-19 outbreaks in communities but most studies have been focusing on sampling from wastewater treatment plants. Institutional level of wastewater surveillance may serve well for early warning purposes since cases can be tracked and immediate action can be executed in the event of positive signal. In this study, a novel Moore swab method was developed and used for wastewater surveillance of COVID-19 at institutional level. Among the 219 swab samples tested, 28 (12.8%) swabs collected from the three campuses and two buildings were positive for SARS-CoV-2. Further individual clinical diagnosis validated the wastewater results and indicated that this method was sensitive enough to detect 1-2 cases in a building. In addition, comparison between grab and Moore swab methods from the hospital sewage line indicated that Moore swab method was more sensitive than the grab sampling method. These results suggest that the Moore swab is a sensitive, practical, and easy to use early warning tool for COVID-19 surveillance especially in low-resource settings and at an early stage of infection in communities.
