Introduction

This project was created to develop and implement a tool to monitor the early circulation of the SARS-CoV-2 virus in the population by analysing critical locations in the urban water cycle, as a proxy for the prevalence of the COVID-19 illness. The project consists of a consortium with several parties and three work packages with pre-determined activities (see Objectives of Project for details). This document entails the activities within work package 3 (WP3) of the Eureka project, which was assigned to Royal HaskoningDHV (RHDHV). This project is a TKI subsidy under RVO and is funded by Health Holland.

WP3 focuses primarily on the data, dashboard and the stakeholder engagement. RHDHV has looked at the usefulness of the data on the virus RNA in sewage for detecting trends in the circulation of the virus in the population. To this end, the research area (see Research area) in the provinces of Utrecht and North Holland were selected in the Netherlands, and municipalities within 7 of the 9 provinces in South Africa were selected.

Data from the SARS-COV-2 viral RNA at various sites (sewage sites (WWTPs) or rivers) were compared with the COVID-19 health data from the test locations (data retrieved where available from national / provincial dashboards).

In the following chapters we discuss the applied methods and the results of the research conducted by RHDHV within WP3.

  • In Chapter 2 we discuss the background of the research and the two activities under work package 3.

  • Chapter 3 presents the research methods and results of the tasks within the activity 3.1: Collection of COVID-19 health and surveillance data and associated open data

  • Chapter 4 presents the methods and results of the tasks within the activity 3.2: Data combination, statistical analysis and modelling,

  • Chapter 5 comprises the stakeholder engagement tasks described under both activity 3.1 and 3.2.