With the second wave of Covid 19 spreading across India, Karnataka has come up with a new sewage surveillance system. It’d be spread across 45 wards out of 198, currently on the pilot basis.
Karnataka Plans to Curb Covid 19 at an Early Stage
As per the latest reports, Rakesh Singh, Additional Chief Secretary, Urban Development and BBMP administrator said that the system will cover over 75 percent of the city’s 9 million population. The new system would be generating over 90 data points per week which would alert the existence of Covid 19 clusters.
He went to Twitter to express himself and said that they are happy to be the first state in India to be able to do so.
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This pilot study is said to be the first of its kind in India. Agencies like the United States Agency for International Development, the Skoll Foundation-supported Covid Action Collab (CAC) have collaborated in the pilot study. They will further be working towards the Bengaluru Civic Agencies like BBMP and BWSSB to carry out the experiment.
Urban Development released a statement regarding the same and said that in the past one year, scientists around the world have discovered that wastewater testing can be a good early warning system. It could predict an increase in Covid 19 before the number of cases could officially rise.
Sewage Testing Will Not Replace Clinical Testing
While the Karnataka government is working towards early detection of Covid 19, it is not a replacement of traditional clinical testing. They have also advised the netizens to follow the Covid 19 safety guidelines.
This new system is expected to detect other pathogens with pandemic potential at an early stage.
Dr. Angela Chaudhuri, Health Lead of CAC said that there have been many experiments in determining if Covid 19 virus was surviving in the sewage. Bengaluru will be joining other nations like Finland, Israel, and the Netherlands in a path-breaking surveillance system. Along with other experts who will be supporting the experiment.
