COVID-19
Bremen relies on wastewater as its crown early warning system
A sample of the wastewater can be seen in the Berlin Water Competence Center. photo
© Stephanie Pilick / dpa / symbol image
In view of the growing number of corona infections, the city of Bremen relies on wastewater analyzes as an early warning system. “Wastewater testing should play a role in terms of what we can expect seven to ten days later,” said Silke Stroth, state councilor at the Department of Health, Bremen’s “Weser-Kurier” (Wednesday) . According to the report, Bremen is participating with 19 other cities and municipalities in a national research project for wastewater monitoring.
In view of the growing number of corona infections, the city of Bremen relies on wastewater analyzes as an early warning system. “Wastewater testing should play a role in terms of what we can expect seven to ten days later,” said Silke Stroth, state councilor at the Department of Health, Bremen’s “Weser-Kurier” (Wednesday) . According to the report, Bremen is participating with 19 other cities and municipalities in a national research project for wastewater monitoring.
According to a spokesperson for the health department, the nationwide research project has been underway since last March. Completion is scheduled for March 2023. The first results are therefore expected in the autumn. So far there is only one extraction point in the city of Bremen, but another extraction point has been registered for Bremerhaven, he said. This means that data on the state of Bremen should also be available in the future.
According to the report, wastewater samples are routinely taken at the Seehausen wastewater treatment plant and sent frozen to a laboratory in Karlsruhe. There, the samples are examined for the Sars-Cov-2 virus and its variants and compared with the number of infections. The increase in viral load can be detected in wastewater 8 to 14 days early, because as soon as a person is infected, they excrete bits of the virus, explained Christoph Bernatzky, head of technology and innovation at Hansewasser in Bremen.
According to health authority spokesman Lukas Fuhrmann, Bremen must await approval from the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) and the Federal Ministry of Health to be able to use viral load data in wastewater.
