University of Guelph testing wastewater for signs of respiratory illnesses

The University of Guelph is once again testing wastewater for signs of respiratory viruses and sharing that information with Wellington Dufferin Guelph Public Health (WDGPH).

Dr. Nicola Mercer, CEO and Medical Officer of Health for WDGPH said, “It will tell us what kinds of things might be coming down the pipe. If we see that influenza, for example, starts to go up, but we don't have any cases, it's telling us that people in our community actually have the flu, who haven't gone to see a doctor, who haven't been tested.”

Guelph's water is being tested for two types of RSV, two types of influenza and COVID.

All the information is made public and can be viewed on the WDGPH influenza dashboard. It currently shows higher rates of RSV B, followed by COVID and RSV A.

“What we've noticed is COVID actually has never gone away to zero,” Mercer said.

“If we look at other respiratory viruses such as RSV or influenza, the flu or the RSV bars, they actually disappeared, and they have never come back quite the same,” she said.

Communities across Ontario began testing wastewater for COVID-19 in 2021, but once provincial funding stopped flowing in September of this year, many programs stopped.

Scientists at the University of Guelph, however, wanted to continue their research. Microbiology professor Lawrence Goodridge said they began applying for grants.

“The funding comes from federal programs, such as the Canada Research Chairs program. Also the Natural Science and Engineering and Research Council of Canada grant programs,” he said.

When asked what the university gets out of the program Goodridge said, “Our mission is to improve life, and during the pandemic, the University of Guelph played a leading role in Ontario, in Canada and even globally in developing approaches, including surveillance to monitor for COVID-19.”

“It’s a wonderful experience for students,” he added.

“This is really good information for our long-term care homes or other vulnerable settings where we could start giving them warnings to say, ‘Hey, we know that this is now circulating. You might want to up your infection prevention and control practices,’” Mercer said.

It can also act as a warning signal.

“During the COVID-19 pandemic, supply chains were severely disrupted, especially those in the biomedical or biomanufacturing fields. What this did was lead to shortages in PPE, for example, and even in diagnostic kits that were used to test for COVID-19,” Goodridge said.

The University of Guelph is also tracking wastewater in the Niagara Region and the University of Windsor is tracking their own municipal wastewater.

“The idea is that if we can provide early warning signals by monitoring wastewater at border cities like Windsor and in the Niagara region, for example, then we'll be able to provide that information so that hospitals and other members of the medical or public health sector can make choices so that we don't see these shortages.” Goodridge said.

Dr. Mercer said she is very happy that WDGPH has access to this information.

“We are just very fortunate that our university is doing this research.”