During the COVID-19 pandemic, wastewater monitoring has been used to monitor the levels of SARS-CoV-2 RNA entering the sewerage system. In Italy, the Istituto Superiore di Sanità coordinated the SARI project (Sorveglianza Ambientale Reflue in Italia) to detect SARS-CoV-2 and its variants. In this study, the concentration of SARS-CoV-2 and its variants in raw wastewater against COVID-19 cases was evaluated together with the effect of temperature and precipitation on virus spread. We validated a predictive model, proposed by De Giglio et al., 2021, to establish the number of COVID-19 cases/100,000 inhabitants. A receiver operating characteristic curve model was applied to predict the number of COVID-19 cases and Poisson regression was applied to study the effect of temperature and rainfall on viral load. In Apulia, from October 2021 to December 2022, we analyzed 1041 samples, of which 985 (94.6%) tested positive for SARS-CoV-2. Median atmospheric temperature was inversely proportional to viral load in wastewater; no correlation was found with precipitation. The predictive model confirmed that at least 11 cases/100,000 inhabitants would occur in the 15 days following the detection of the virus in wastewater. Environmental surveillance of SARS-CoV-2 can be used to map the virus and its variants.

在 COVID-19 大流行期间，废水监测已用于监测进入污水系统的 SARS-CoV-2 RNA 水平。在意大利，Istituto Superiore di Sanità 协调 SARI 项目（意大利 Sorveglianza Ambientale Reflue）来检测 SARS-CoV-2 及其变种。在这项研究中，评估了针对 COVID-19 病例的原废水中 SARS-CoV-2 及其变体的浓度，以及温度和降水对病毒传播的影响。我们验证了 De Giglio 等人于 2021 年提出的预测模型，以确定每 100,000 名居民中的 COVID-19 病例数。应用受试者工作特征曲线模型来预测 COVID-19 病例数，并应用泊松回归研究温度和降雨量对病毒载量的影响。从 2021 年 10 月到 2022 年 12 月，我们在普利亚分析了 1041 个样本，其中 985 个样本（94.6%）检测出 SARS-CoV-2 阳性。平均大气温度与废水中的病毒载量成反比；没有发现与降水量的相关性。预测模型证实，在废水中检测到病毒后的 15 天内，每 10 万居民至少会出现 11 例病例。SARS-CoV-2 的环境监测可用于绘制病毒及其变种的图谱。