Tracking national opinion about wastewater monitoring as a standard complement of public health tools in the United States
Year: 2023
Type: preprint
Study design: Observational Study
Abstract: National opinion on a wide variety of public health topics can change over time or have highly contextual nuisances. As the COVID-19 pandemic has progressed, we aimed to see how public perceptions have changed regarding the acceptance of using wastewater for community health monitoring in the metropolitan United States. This study is an annual update of prior inquiry into knowledge of wastewater-based epidemiology, privacy concerns surrounding the collection of wastewater samples and the use of data acquired along with privacy awareness from an online survey administered in the winter of 2023. We found public support for monitoring of toxins (90.8%), disease (90.6%), terror (86.8%), illicit drugs (70.5%), prescription medications (68.6%), and gun residue (59.8%) remained high. Most respondents supported monitoring of the entire city (77.6%). This longitudinal research has shown year-upon-year only slight increases in public support of wastewater monitoring for public health protection and continues to show an absence of significant nationwide privacy concerns as long as catchment population sizes ensure fully anonymous households. This support is conditional and is probably best understood through the lens of the COVID-19 pandemic where the value proposition of public protection was popularized. The survey also consistently showed the public would support expansion of wastewater monitoring as a standard complement of public health tools into other areas of public health protection.
Source: medRxiv
Institution: University of Louisville
Language: English
Subfield: Infectious Diseases
Field: Medicine
Domain: Health Sciences
Open Access status: green
Funder: James Graham Brown Foundation
OpenAlex ID: W4381377268