DENVER — We learned during the pandemic that you can track COVID transmission through wastewater, and the state's been doing that monitoring for a few years.
Now the City of Denver has launched its own pilot program to get some hyper-local data specific to Denver communities – from the city's sewers.
The Denver Department of Public Health and Environment staff is working to collect wastewater samples.
"Wastewater is a leading indicator for looking at disease transmission," said Courtney Ronner with Denver's health department.
The state has tested for COVID throughout the pandemic, but Denver started this program to get more localized data that can act as an early warning system for public health officials.
"The good thing about testing wastewater is you can actually get a better look at illnesses before people start having symptoms," said Ronner. "Right now we're just testing elementary schools. But we will eventually be testing in shelters for people experiencing homelessness, jails, senior living facilities, just to get a better idea of disease transmission."
Edison and Garfield elementary schools in northwest Denver are the first two testing sites.
The health department said they chose elementary schools because it's about collecting data consistently – and in general, schools have the same group of people coming and going everyday, so the samples are consistent.
Wastewater sampling started this week. It will be collected at sewer access points on public grounds or in manholes near the participating testing locations.
"This is part of managing COVID-19 in the endemic phase," said Ronner. "Now we're looking at – how are we going to manage COVID as its become part of our daily life?"
Right now, COVID isn't so top of mind. But if it starts to show back up in the sewers – Denver's health department is watching.
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