COVID-19: Singapore using human faeces to track coronavirus outspread

With an average of over 200 new coronavirus cases each day for the past week, the Singapore government had earlier announced than they are expected to start phase two of re-opening the economy.

Singapore now has almost 42,000 COVID-19 cases - a hefty number for a nation with 5.7 million people but this is down to substantial testing especially in migrant workers dormitories. 

The "Lion City" has now vowed to boost the health of all the 325,000 foreign workers who mostly work in tough jobs, which the locals shy away from doing in construction, shipyards, waste management and landscaping.

The ministry of manpower, as of June 15, claimed that 75,000 workers have been cleared of the novel virus who live in local dormitories. 

The government of Singapore also introduced a new way of surveillance is by testing human waste and wastewater for signs of the pathogen.

The National Environment Agency (NEA), National Water Agency PUB and Home Team Science and Technology Agency (HTX), during a joint press statement last week announced that a pilot surveillance programme has been set to screen wastewater samples for the coronavirus.

Tracing the spread of COVID-19 through wastewater and sewage is not a new strategy. Previously, researchers in China, Italy, France, Netherlands, and Australia have all reported tracing the highly contagious virus in wastewater in toilets and sewers. 

With the help from local university scientists and from the Singapore-Massachusetts Institute of Technology Alliance for Research and Technology (SMART) - the sampling and testing methodology was evolved.

Their first goal was to focus on assessing the situation and reducing the transmission of the novel coronavirus at dormitories of migrant workers.

Samples were also taken from the sewerage systems in the dormitories to screen for genetic material from the virus and resersh showed that those with mild or no symptoms can shed the virus in their stools.

In the near future, the wastewater samples can also catch details on a cross-section of the community, allowing them to observe large groups at once. It also provides them with the opportunity for more targeted clinical testing.

Access to this type of data could underpin a surveillance programme to identify areas where there is evidence of COVID-19 outbreaks without requiring the testing of all individuals.

It is also relatively inexpensive and could be useful for countries, for example in Africa, that do not have the technical or logistical means to test carriers of the virus.

(with ANI inputs)