As of today, the cabinet has an important indicator for the corona virus. In addition to the test results of the GGDs and patient numbers in hospitals, the sewers now also show how the virus spreads, Trouw writes.
Already in the spring it was clear that the sewer could be a source of information. Infected people not only have virus particles in their nose or lungs, but also in their stool.
Often one or two days before the first complaints manifest themselves. Measurements already signaled an outbreak when the first infected had to report to the GGD.
Measurements not really reliable so far
But those measurements only provided a national average and were not really reliable. There are 317 sewer measuring points and 355 municipalities, says project leader Ana Maria de Roda Husman of RIVM.
‘So sometimes more municipalities are connected to one sewer point and we had to find out what share each municipality had. It also turned out that the network of the measuring points did not completely overlap with the municipal boundaries. ‘
See per municipality whether virus is gaining or losing ground
On the basis of postal codes and Statistics Netherlands data, they calculated how many inhabitants per measuring point were involved. ‘Now we can use the sewage water to show per municipality and per hundred thousand inhabitants whether the virus is gaining or losing ground.’
Source: ANP MediaWatch / Trouw
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