MDHHS Begins Monitoring Wastewater To Track The SARS-CoV-2 Virus

On December 8th, Michigan Department of Health and Human Services (MDHHS) announced that they were going to begin monitoring COVID-19 wastewater to find and keep track of the SARS-CoV-2 virus across Michigan. The data is going to be acquired through the many wastewater monitoring sites across Michigan and the information will be released through Sentinel Wastewater Epidemiology Evaluation Project (SWEEP) in the form of a dashboard. 

The results of these tests will be able to catch the virus before people get sick or tested, and help the community to set public health responses into motion. Dr. Alexis Travis, MDHHS senior deputy director, public health administration said, “The SWEEP data provides an in-depth overview of wastewater monitoring efforts at regional and statewide levels”.

The collection of this information is entirely non-invasive and only brings up communities as a whole and not individually.