By: Tim Kays
Members of the Bryan City Council were informed of a new municipal COVID testing program at their December 21 meeting. Carried out under the auspices of the Ohio Department of Health (ODH), the early numbers for Bryan may be indicating an impending spike in viral infections in the near future.
“The Mayor asked me to give you a little background information on a project that we were asked to contribute to for the Ohio Department of Health,” said Wes Wygant, Wastewater Treatment Plant Supervisor.
“What it amounts to is they are using wastewater plants around the state, and they are using raw wastewater as a sampling medium for the RNA of the COVID-19 virus. What the scientists have found is that by studying the amount of RNA in the influent water at a wastewater treatment plant, you can kind of get a snapshot of just how prevalent the bug is in the community.”
“What they’ve come up with is that if they plot it out on a graph, you can see a surge in infection coming about 3 to 10 days ahead of time.”
Wygant continued, “And so they contacted me right before Thanksgiving and asked if we’d be willing to provide them with samples twice a week, and of course I said sure we would. There’s no cost to the City of Bryan. They provide all the material. They provide shipping boxes.”
“So we joined in, and there does appear to be some relevant statistical data that comes from the study that they’re doing. Our local health department now is starting to receive information. We’re the only one in Williams County at this point that I know of that’s participating in the study. But again, looking at the numbers on the graph, it does appear that it’s a useful endeavor.”
“I had informed the Mayor about it; she thought that it’s something you guys would be interested in, so she asked me to come in tonight and just give you a breakdown on it.”
Reiterating the process with the ODH, Wygant said, “They send us sample containers twice a week, and we ship them back overnight to them. The Health Department ultimately receives the data that comes from it.”
“Looking at the graph, you can see that the RNA that shows up at the wastewater plant is out in front of the positive tests that will be seen at the hospitals and medical facilities. They’re saying 3 to 10 days ahead of time, so it is like an early warning system for the Health Department, and it seems to be really handy for them.
Mayor Carrie Schlade elaborated further saying, “The Department of Health actually sent Wes, Jim Watkins (Williams County Health District Commissioner), and Brad Price (Williams County Health District Director of Environmental Health) an email regarding the Bryan Wastewater Treatment Plant, and said that it had three sustained samples over a seven day period of an increase of 100 fold in the viral load. So they are anticipating that we are going to have some kind of spike in the very near future.”
Going by the Million Gene Copies (MGC) per day data for the month, the case for a COVID spike in the near future is strong. Beginning with the low measurement of 93,000 MGC per day on December 2, the population jumped to 170,000 MGC on December 6.”
“The 200,000 MGC threshold was broken three days later with a 230,000 MGC count on December 9, and on December 13, the MGC number skyrocketed to 470,000, more than doubling the population in just four days.”
“I can tell you when we talked to Jim Watkins,” Mayor Schlade continued, “…when Wes and I connected on this testing, he was actually really happy that somebody Williams County was doing that.”
“It should help with them predicting on staffing levels: one – in the contact tracing arena; two – in a hospital and medical provider arena. So even in that, it helps for them to plan. I think anybody that knows they need to work some overtime, getting a 5 to 10 day lead time is helpful.”
Tim can be reached at tim@thevillagereporter.com
