Exploring adenovirus in water environments: a systematic review and meta-analysis

Adenoviruses (AdVs) have a significant impact in both medical and environmental contexts. The objective of this study was to investigate the prevalence of AdV in different water types, such as untreated and treated wastewater, surface water, groundwater, drinking water, and other water matrices. A total of 239 articles were included in this meta-analysis. Adenoviruses were detected in various waters worldwide. The overall prevalence in water was found to be 59.2%, with the highest prevalence in untreated wastewater (83.1%) and treated wastewater (75.3%), followed by "other water matrices" (53.4%), surface water (49.5%) drinking water (22.7%), and groundwater (18.5%). Most of the studies did not assess the viability of the viruses, leading to weak links between water contamination and risk. Both human and animal AdV were found in water environments. The findings suggest that water, including drinking water, could be a significant route of AdV transmission in both developed and developing economies.

Environmental Health Literacy: an index to study its relations with pro-environmental behaviors

 

The citizen’ awareness about environmental health risks has been identified as an important determinant of citizens’ choices for the adoption of pro-environmental behaviors, but for its study simple measures to be applied in population studies are still lacking. The Environmental Health Literacy (EHL), is a recent sub-cathegory of health literacy, including functional, critical and interactive dimensions, that can be applied in surveys on environmental health risk perception and behaviors. The aim of our study was to elaborate and validate an EHL Index (ELHI) using data from a large multicenter survey carried out among 4778 students of different disciplines in 15 Italian Universities, with a self-administered anonymous questionnaire investigating risk perceptions, attitudes and behaviors towards environmental health risks and including a simple Functional Health Literacy test (FHL). From the original questionnaire of 56 items three sets of questions were selected to represent the three dimensions of health literacy (Functional, Critical or Interactive) and their outcomes were compared with the answers about FHL test and pro-environmental behaviors. The Principal Component Analysis was used to select the most representative questions that were then grouped in the EHLI. The index was significantly associated with both FHL test and behaviors questions. The ROC curve indicated a satisfying accuracy and was used to identify the best cut-off for ELHI. In conclusion the constructed ELHI can be considered reliable and useful for further population surveys in similar target people to plan communication interventions about environmental health risks and their prevention through individual choices.

Key messages

Impact of the environment on the health: From theory to practice

The Erice 56 Charter titled "Impact of the environment on the health: from theory to practice" was unanimously approved at the end of the 56th course of the "International School of Epidemiology and Preventive Medicine G. D'Alessandro" held from 3rd to November 7, 2019 in Erice - Sicily (Italy) and promoted by the Study Group of "Environment and Health" of the Italian Society of Hygiene, Preventive Medicine and Public Health. The course, that included lectures, open discussions and guided working groups, was aimed to provide a general training on epidemiological and toxicological aspects of the environmental health impact, to be used by public health professionals for risk assessment, without forgetting the risk communications. At the end of the course 12 key points were agreed among teachers and students: they underlined the need of specific training and research, in the perspective of "One Health" and "Global Health", also facing emerging scientific and methodological issues and focusing on communication towards stakeholders. This Discussion highlight the need to improve knowledge of Health and Environment topic in all sectors of health and environmental prevention and management.

Twitter monitoring evidence of Covid-19 infodemic in Italy

Background

Risk communication is essential for risk management, especially during alarming events, in order to create a balanced risk perception. The tweets follow up can be useful to timely evidence “media storms” or “infodemics” thus suggesting corrective interventions. The spread of Covid-19 has been the occasion to observe the evolution of tweets about this topic, with the aim of evidence peaks of fear

Methods

On 30th January 2020 we started a large collection of Italian and English tweets containing the following keywords: “coronavirus”, “2019-nCov”, “CoronavirusOutbreak”, “CoronavirusWho”, “WuhanCoronavirus”, “coronaviruschina”, “coronavirusitalia”, “virus cina”, “virus cinese”, “virus mascherine”, “virus paura”, “virus polmonite” and “virus vaccine”. “Covid-19” and “SARS-CoV-2” were added later. For the data collection Twitter Streaming API was used.

Results

The total number of tweets collected till 26th February was approximately 20M, 2M in Italian and 18M in English. The trend of the volume of tweets gathered shows a first small peak between Jan 30th and Feb 1st, but a second, higher, peak is visible after the 21st February, following the report of the Covid-19 clusters in Italy. Italian tweets account for 6% of the first peak and for 22% of the second. The Italian word “paura” firstly appeared on Feb 5th, with a peak after Feb 21th.

Conclusions

”infodemics” or “media storms”, are situations of uncontrolled diffusion of news and opinion, frequently leading to irrational and counterproductive behaviors. The Italian evolution of tweets indicate since the first day of cluster report, a clear escalation of fear, that suggests timely corrective actions to facilitate the disease control.

Key messages

With the twitter monitoring we demonstrate that since 21th February an infodemic is spreading in Italy.

The twitter follow up can be used to timely evidence a public alarm, motivate corrective interventions and. evaluate the efficacy of them.

The potential for coronavirus transmission in waters: what do we know?

Background

Although the main route of transmission of SARS-CoV2 is via droplets and close contact, concerns about the possible secondary transmission via waters is growing given evidence for SARS-CoV2 faecal elimination. Here we review studies on coronavirus in water environments.

Methods

A review was carried out of papers writen in English on PubMed, Scopus and Web of Science. Papers were identified using the keywords: coronavirus, SARS, MERS, Covid-19 associated with water, surface water, drinking water, wastewater, sewage, slurry, sludge, biosolid. Papers were screened using their title and abstract to confirm their relevance. They were then reviewed to identify: coronavirus type and strain, type of water sample, type of study, detection methods, monitoring data, survival data, effect of disinfection and treatments.

Results

Since 1978, only 18 papers met the selection criteria. Of these, 11 reported experimental studies, 6 field studies, and one included both field and experimental work. Experimental studies were carried out using samples spiked with SARS-CoV or surrogates: 4 addressed the recovery efficiency of detection methods; 3 reported studies on virus removal from waters by different treatments; 7 were focussed on survival in water samples with results ranging from 2 to > 100 days, depending on virus, type of water, temperature, and detection method. Field studies monitored the presence of coronavirus in waters, sewage, slurry or biosolid. The included in total no more than 200 samples and used different detection methods. Some samples tested positive in 5 studies.

Conclusions

While knowledge of coronavirus in waters appears very scarce and fragmentary, the recent SARS-CoV2 emergency demands new attention be focussed on its survival in natural conditions and following treatment in order to assess the risk of waterborne and food borne transmission as well as developing monitoring within sewage treatment facilities.

Key messages

The potential spread of SARS-CoV2 through waters cannot be excluded without better knowledge.

Urgent research on this topic is required.

Enteric viruses, somatic coliphages and Vibrio species in marine bathing and non-bathing waters in Italy

Microbial safety of recreational waters is a significant public health issue. In this study we assessed the occurrence and quantity of enteric viruses in bathing and non-bathing waters in Italy, in parallel with microbial faecal indicators, somatic coliphages and Vibrio spp. Enteric viruses (aichivirus, norovirus and enterovirus) were detected in 55% of bathing water samples, including samples with bacterial indicator concentrations compliant with the European bathing water Directive. Aichivirus was the most frequent and abundant virus. Adenovirus was detected only in non-bathing waters. Somatic coliphages were identified in 50% bathing water samples, 80% of which showed simultaneous presence of viruses. Vibrio species were ubiquitous, with 9 species identified, including potential pathogens (V. cholerae, V. parahaemoylticus and V. vulnificus). This is the first study showing the occurrence and high concentration of Aichivirus in bathing waters and provides original information, useful in view of a future revision of the European Directive.