The COVID-19 pandemic sparked widespread implementation of wastewater surveillance in communities across the United States to help track the spread of the disease. In contrast to clinical laboratory testing that tracks individual cases of infection, wastewater surveillance provides a way to measure the amount of DNA from pathogens coming from homes, businesses, and other institutions that share a sewer system. To help coordinate and centralize early efforts, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) launched the National Wastewater Surveillance System (NWSS) in September 2020, with pilot sites in eight states. As of April 2024, the NWSS is receiving data from more than 1,300 active sampling sites, covering a population of 130 million individuals.
