Detection of SARS-COV-2 coronavirus in waste water

摘要

Avacta Group, the developer of Affimer® biotherapeutics and reagents, announce that it has entered into a collaboration with Integumen to evaluate recently generated Affimer reagents that bind the SARS-COV-2 spike protein for the detection of the coronavirus in waste water, to provide a real-time alert system to warn of localised COVID-19 outbreaks. Over 60 percent of COVID-19 positive patients had gastrointestinal symptoms, such as diarrhoea, nausea and vomiting, and the SARS-COV-2 virus was found in their faecal samples. Sampling waste water from households may therefore provide an early warning system for localised outbreaks in communities. Recently, Avacta announced that it had generated a number of highly specific Affimer reagents that detect the SARS-COV-2 virus spike protein for use in diagnostic tests and in neutralising therapies.