We were recently interviewed by the Sacramento NBC station to discuss sewage sampling to detect the SARS-CoV-2 virus that causes the COVID-19 disease. This is a very useful tool not only for COVID-19 but for general epidemiology studies. Wastewater (sewage) generated by people contains chemical and biological entities (biomarkers) that include an extremely wide range of drugs and viruses. Wastewater-based epidemiology (WBE) is a technique for determining the consumption of, or exposure to chemicals or pathogens in a population. Think of this as urine and fecal analysis on a community scale https://www.kcra.com/article/how-testing-sewage-could-help-slow-spread-of-covid-19/34526692