Environmental Surveillance For Sars Cov 2 To Complement Other Public Health Surveillance

Environmental surveillance (ES) for SARS-COV-2 has been used in many locations to augment clinical data and support public health decision making. ES provides additional evidence on virus in circulation at population level such as presence or absence, early warning of increasing or decreasing trends, and information on variants of concern or interest. This guidance updates interim guidance published in April 2022 and provides advice on: What situations ES has been shown to add value to public health decision making. What is needed to plan and coordinate an effective ES programme. How to carry out data collection, analysis, interpretation and communication of results. This guidance is targeted at public health officials who want to understand and integrate complementary ES into COVID-19 control strategies.

This book reviews the recent challenges and future perspectives involved in the wastewater-based epidemiology (WBE) for COVID-19. The book aims to improve the monitoring of COVID-19 in wastewater by focusing on recent scientific studies in the surveillance and treatment of wastewater containing SARS-CoV-RNA, assessment of COVID-19 in the community and delivering a new scientific understanding of prevalence and re-emergence based on the WBE. It also provides a global perspective on effective detection methods for the analysis and interpretation of the RNA count of SARS-CoV-2 virus in wastewater and predicts the effects wastewater may have on the infection rate. Readers will find in this book case studies from France, India and Southeast Asian of non-invasive population-based monitoring of SARS-CoV-2 through sewage surveillance, and will learn more about the virus behaviour and transmission in different environmental settings. The significance of membrane technologies for virusremoval from water is also addressed in this book, as well as advanced techniques for identifying, quantifying, and characterizing SARS-CoV-2 in activated sludge and wastewater. The book provides a great interface to researchers such as microbiologists, environmental engineers, data scientists and civil engineers, emphasizing issues related to the current monitoring methodology. Furthermore, it also encourages researchers and policymakers by raising awareness of potential new methodologies for wastewater surveillance and accurate monitoring of COVID-19.

Provides the latest QMRA methodologies to determine infection risk cause by either accidental microbial infections or deliberate infections caused by terrorism • Reviews the latest methodologies to quantify at every step of the microbial exposure pathways, from the first release of a pathogen to the actual human infection • Provides techniques on how to gather information, on how each microorganism moves through the environment, how to determine their survival rates on various media, and how people are exposed to the microorganism • Explains how QMRA can be used as a tool to measure the impact of interventions and identify the best policies and practices to protect public health and safety • Includes new information on genetic methods • Techniques use to develop risk models for drinking water, groundwater, recreational water, food and pathogens in the indoor environment

Early detection is essential to the control of emerging, reemerging, and novel infectious diseases, whether naturally occurring or intentionally introduced. Containing the spread of such diseases in a profoundly interconnected world requires active vigilance for signs of an outbreak, rapid recognition of its presence, and diagnosis of its microbial cause, in addition to strategies and resources for an appropriate and efficient response. Although these actions are often viewed in terms of human public health, they also challenge the plant and animal health communities. Surveillance, defined as "the continual scrutiny of all aspects of occurrence and spread of a disease that are pertinent to effective control", involves the "systematic collection, analysis, interpretation, and dissemination of health data." Disease detection and diagnosis is the act of discovering a novel, emerging, or reemerging disease or disease event and identifying its cause. Diagnosis is "the cornerstone of effective disease control and prevention efforts, including surveillance." Disease surveillance and detection relies heavily on the astute individual: the clinician, veterinarian, plant pathologist, farmer, livestock manager, or agricultural extension agent who notices something unusual, atypical, or suspicious and brings this discovery in a timely way to the attention of an appropriate representative of human public health, veterinary medicine, or agriculture. Most developed countries have the ability to detect and diagnose human, animal, and plant diseases. Global Infectious Disease Surveillance and Detection: Assessing the Challenges-Finding Solutions, Workshop Summary is part of a 10 book series and summarizes the recommendations and presentations of the workshop.

This fully updated edition of Infectious Disease Surveillance is for frontline public health practitioners, epidemiologists, and clinical microbiologists who are engaged in communicable disease control. It is also a foundational text for trainees in public health, applied epidemiology, postgraduate medicine and nursing programs. The second edition portrays both the conceptual framework and practical aspects of infectious disease surveillance. It is a comprehensive resource designed to improve the tracking of infectious diseases and to serve as a starting point in the development of new surveillance systems. Infectious Disease Surveillance includes over 45 chapters from over 100 contributors, and topics organized into six sections based on major themes. Section One highlights the critical role surveillance plays in public health and it provides an overview of the current International Health Regulations (2005) in addition to successes and challenges in infectious disease eradication. Section Two describes surveillance systems based on logical program areas such as foodborne illnesses, vector-borne diseases, sexually transmitted diseases, viral hepatitis healthcare and transplantation associated infections. Attention is devoted to programs for monitoring unexplained deaths, agents of bioterrorism, mass gatherings, and disease associated with international travel. Sections Three and Four explore the uses of the Internet and wireless technologies to advance infectious disease surveillance in various settings with emphasis on best practices based on deployed systems. They also address molecular laboratory methods, and statistical and geospatial analysis, and evaluation of systems for early epidemic detection. Sections Five and Six discuss legal and ethical considerations, communication strategies and applied epidemiology-training programs. The rest of the chapters offer public-private partnerships, as well lessons from the 2009-2010 H1N1 influenza pandemic and future directions for infectious disease surveillance.

Following the attacks of September 11, 2001 and the anthrax letters, the ability to detect biological threats as quickly as possible became a top priority. In 2003 the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) introduced the BioWatch program-a federal monitoring system intended to speed detection of specific biological agents that could be released in aerosolized form during a biological attack. The present volume evaluates the costs and merits of both the current BioWatch program and the plans for a new generation of BioWatch devices. BioWatch and Public Health Surveillance also examines infectious disease surveillance through hospitals and public health agencies in the United States, and considers whether BioWatch and traditional infectious disease surveillance are redundant or complementary.

The WHO Global Influenza Surveillance and Response System (GISRS) has played an important role in the COVID-19 pandemic response. By leveraging the existing influenza surveillance systems to integrate SARS-CoV-2 testing in specimens collected from influenza surveillance sources, countries have been able to maintain influenza surveillance and establish a system for monitoring SARS-CoV-2 circulation in communities. This required the existing systems to undergo a variety of adaptations and adjustments, and countries have employed various strategies. This document is a collection of experiences and lessons learned from countries towards integrated influenza and SARS-CoV-2 sentinel surveillance.