CORONAVIRUS —
TESTING — WASTEWATER
998. Hon Dr BRIAN WALKER to the minister representing the
Minister for Health:
I refer the minister to reports last
month that suggested that viral fragments of COVID-19 had been detected in
wastewater at Mansfield, Aireys Inlet and Apollo Bay in Victoria.
(1) What is the
current state of wastewater treatment and monitoring efforts in Western Australia
and are we testing or able to test for traces of COVID in wastewater as a matter
of course?
(2) Have any positive test results
been confirmed in WA to date?
Hon
STEPHEN DAWSON replied:
I thank the honourable member for
some notice of the question.
The following answer has been
provided on behalf of the Minister for Health.
(1) Western Australia
has a wastewater surveillance program that detects SARS-CoV-2 fragments, the
virus that causes the clinical illness COVID-19.The wastewater surveillance
program involves weekly testing of untreated sewage from six metropolitan
wastewater treatment plants—Alkimos, Beenyup, Gordon Rd, Point Peron,
Subiaco and Woodman Point—and 12 regional wastewater treatment plants
across the 10 regional localities of Albany,
Broome, Bunbury, Busselton, Esperance, Geraldton, Kalgoorlie, Karratha,
Northam and South Hedland.
(2) SARS-CoV-2 has previously been detected in the
Subiaco wastewater treatment plant catchment in the context of known
positive cases in hotel quarantine, and in the Beenyup wastewater treatment
plant catchment in the context of a community outbreak. Those detections were
expected. An unexpected wastewater detection
of SARS-CoV-2 occurred in Broome in August 2021 when there were no community
cases. This prompted a public health response. Repeat wastewater testing was
negative and clinical testing did not detect any COVID-19 cases.