SARS-CoV-2 Detection in Sewage in Santiago, Chile - Preliminary results

The detection of viruses in sewage is a method of environmental surveillance, which allows evaluating the circulation of different viruses in a community. This study presents the first results of sewage surveillance to detect the circulation of SARS-CoV-2 virus in Santiago, Chile. Using ultracentrifugation associated with RT-qPCR, we detected SARS-CoV-2 in untreated and treated wastewater samples obtained two treatment plants, which together process around 85% of the wastewater from the city. This is the first report of detection of SARS-CoV-2 in sewage in Chile and indicates that wastewater surveillance could be a sensitive tool useful as a predictive marker of the circulation of the virus in a population and therefore, be used as an early warning tool.