UNAM CALLS FOR THE STUDY OF WASTEWATER TO DETECT THE PRESENCE OF CORONAVIRUSES

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Experts from the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) warned that it is necessary to have wastewater surveillance, revision, and monitoring system to detect the presence of the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus.

According to a UNAM statement, Ana Cecilia Espinosa García and Marisa Mazari -from the National Laboratory for Sustainability Sciences (LANCIS) – and Adalberto Noyola, from the Institute of Engineering, stressed the need to know the quality of this resource to avoid epidemiological outbreaks.

This network will make it possible to alert the health system and the population early about possible future viruses such as the one that causes COVID-19.

“Surveillance to detect pathogenic organisms in wastewater can be an early warning since it will allow us to know what we dispose of to the environment,” emphasized Marisa Mazari.

According to experts, efforts have been made in the country to detect the presence of COVID-19 in wastewater, with a group from the Engineering Institute  (in two treatment plants in Querétaro); at Tec de Monterrey and Arizona State University with the Mexico City Water System.

It is worth mentioning that in the Netherlands, Spain and Italy, scientists started to trace COVID-19 in wastewater, even specialists from Barcelona reported that the coronavirus was already in Spain a year before the pandemic broke out.

Source: mardefondo.online

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