Wastewater tracking shows COVID and flu data as sickness levels rise in Alberta

New data is now available through wastewater tracking, providing information about COVID-19 and common flu levels in the water systems, as sickness levels are climbing in Alberta.

Kevin Frankowski, co-lead for the Pan Alberta Wastewater Monitoring team based at the University of Calgary, says the flu is spiking in Calgary, but since this data is new, there is no historical reference point to measure it against.

But while we don’t know for sure if levels are higher than normal, Frankowski has a theory that may explain why so many people are sick right now.

“There’s this concept called ‘immunity debt’, where if we’ve been avoiding certain pathogens for a while, our system hasn’t had a chance to keep up, and once they come back, they kinda hit us with a bit of a vengeance so that might be what’s going on,” Frankowski explained.

COVID levels are also climbing in Calgary – you can see this data online publicly. The province started to see the rise in COVID-19 cases around July 13.

The Pan Alberta team is also now able to see which variants are most prominent. Right now, BA.4 and BA.5 are taking over.

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“If we see the numbers climbing and a new variant is displaying an old variant quite quickly, that’s probably indicating the start of a new wave,” Frankowski said.

This data is being put together through a collaboration of teams at the University of Calgary, University of Alberta, Alberta Health, and municipalities across the province.

The teams hope to add more pathogens to this growing list of data, as another tool in fighting infection.