Detection of human pathogenic viruses in the wastewater environment in Hanoi, 2020 – 2021

Abstract

Environment surveillance (ES) for human pathogenic viruses is proactive published health surveillance adopted by many countries. In Vietnam, such ES has not been conducted and there have been no reports on pathogenic viruses in community wastewater. Based on the ES for poliovirus which was implemented in Hanoi on 11/2020. This study aims to investigate the occurrence of human viruses in community wastewater. Fifty-three untreated wastewater samples were monthly collected from the inlet of two sewage treatment plants and four major collector sewers of rivers in Hanoi from 11/2020 to 12/2021. The samples were concentrated by using the two-phase DextranPEG method and then were tested for the presence of enteroviruses, rotavirus, norovirus, and adenovirus. Enteroviruses were isolated from 6/53 wastewater samples (11.32%) that were further determined as echovirus 3, 6 and 11, each serotype comprised two samples. Rotavirus, norovirus genogroup I (GI), norovirus GII, and adenovirus were detected in 24 (45.28%), 16 (30.18%), 27 (50.94%) và 33 (62.26%) samples, respectively. The results show the feasibility of combining the proactive ES for poliovirus and other enteric viruses, especially for common pathogenic viruses, including norovirus and adenovirus, of which the patient-based surveillance system has not been implemented in Vietnam.