The Bavarian wastewater monitoring for monitoring the corona pandemic is now freely accessible on the Internet for all interested parties. “We now use wastewater data from all administrative districts in Bavaria for our wastewater monitoring. This puts us at the top in a national comparison,” said Health Minister Klaus Holetschek (CSU) in Munich. The results of the corona wastewater monitoring as part of the Bay-VOC joint project can be found on the website can currently be viewed online from 20 Bavarian locations.
The virological monitoring of the infection process is based on three pillars, said Holetschek. In addition to wastewater monitoring and the recording of respiratory diseases in medical practices, this also included the Sars-CoV-2 infection data from the Bay-VOC joint project. A total of more than twelve million euros have been invested in this. “This not only helps us to identify new waves of corona infections at an early stage, but also when dealing with other viruses.”
Wastewater monitoring complements the established indicators of pandemic monitoring and thus provides additional insights into the development of the infection process. “In principle, Sars-CoV-2 gene fragments excreted by infected people in the wastewater can be detected using molecular biology and their quantity can be determined to a certain extent,” said Caroline Herr, member of the management board at the State Office for Health and Food Safety (LGL). The sampling of individual locations over a longer period of time can thus provide indications of developments in the infection process there and information on the occurrence of certain virus variants.
By clicking on one of the locations on the map, the online dashboard shows the respective trend in the Sars-CoV-2 viral load in the wastewater and for some locations also the ratio of the Sars-CoV-2 virus variants circulating in the wastewater. Currently, the laboratory results from Altötting, Berchtesgaden, Bad Reichenhall, Piding, Teisendorf, Freilassing, Ebersberg, Munich, Grafing, Passau, Straubing, Weiden, Bayreuth, Hof, Erlangen, Nuremberg, Schweinfurt, Augsburg, Stadtbergen and Königsbrunn are presented visually. The sites are sampled twice a week, and the wastewater monitoring map is updated once a week.
The interactive wastewater monitoring map will be gradually expanded to include data from other Bavarian locations. “Our goal is to link the network of sampling points in Bavaria even more closely by mid-2023 and to make additional data available online so that a representative overview is possible,” said Holetschek. The online presentation of the wastewater monitoring was initiated by Bay-VOC, the Bavarian network for the observation and recording of worrying virus variants (“Variants of Concern”, VOC), which was launched by decision of the Council of Ministers in February 2021 and has played an important role ever since plays in monitoring the corona pandemic.