St. Augustine tests its wastewater for COVID-19

ST. AUGUSTINE, Fla. — The nation’s oldest city has a new tool to detect a possible COVID19.

For the past two weeks, employees at the city of St. Augustine’s Wastewater Treatment Plant have been collecting raw sewage, putting it in small jars and shipping it to a lab in Arizona.

The water samples could give leaders like city manager John Regan a better idea of the coronavirus in the community.

“Any type of heads up of a change of a public health pattern is an advantage,” said Regan.

Right now, dozens of researchers from around the world are turning to wastewater to flush out COVID19.

“Reports out of Europe are that you’re getting as much as a 6-day jump on knowledge that there is a COVID cluster somewhere,” said Regan.

If a significant uptick is detected, Regan would make two calls.

One to the health department and the other to the city’s fire department.

“And say we believe there are sick people with COVID what is happening in your call volume? What types of calls? Are you concerned?” said Regan.

One key advantage of doing this type of testing is the speed.

Regan said the health department currently monitors hospital reports and over the counter flu medicine sales which has some slowness to it.

Testing wastewater is not only faster, and less invasive but it can detect asymptomatic people who are passing the virus through their feces.

“That rapid intervention is how you prevent a cluster from becoming an epidemic and it’s how you keep an epidemic from becoming a pandemic,” said Regan.

Regan said it costs the city about $200 per sample. The results are expected back next week.

JEA is also doing similar testing. A spokesperson tells Action News Jax that Jacksonville’s results are expected back in three to four weeks.

© 2020 Cox Media Group