Wastewater monitoring at the world soccer games.

Verily Health logo

Share

Verily

Sightline is Verily’s public health business unit. Sightline’s wastewater program provides the end-to-end laboratory, logistics, and data infrastructure for wastewater monitoring — a critical tool for providing an unbiased, comprehensive, and cost-effective early warning signal for public health.

Verily works with our clients to collect samples from a variety of locations throughout the wastewater system–from treatment plants representing millions of people to pipes accessed by manholes for specific facilities and institutions. Verily has currently implemented assays to test for 30+ pathogens and are conducting research and development into several more. We work with our partners to identify pathogens of interest and develop approaches to monitor these in wastewater. Verily tests wastewater for the concentrations of nucleic acids from many pathogens. The specific pathogens vary by program and may change over time.

Please enter in the city name of the location you are interested in to see if that site has wastewater monitoring data available. Verily provides the testing for many, but not all of these sites. Samples from these other sites are tested in other public health, academic or commercial labs.

Rather than looking at any one data point, we recommend monitoring trends over time. See below for more details on how to interpret the levels and trends. Our analysis suggests that the concentrations of pathogen genes are highly correlated to clinical incidence rates in the sewersheds. See publications listed <a href='/solutions/public-health/wastewater' target='_self'>here</a> for more detail. For more information about interpreting wastewater trends, see <a href='https://www.cdc.gov/nwss/wastewater-surveillance.html' target='_blank'>guidance from the CDC</a>.

Some locations are not part of this world soccer games experience. For more details on the data, including graphs and heat maps, please visit the Public health dashboard.

Public health dashboard

We examine all wastewater sample concentration results from a specific site over the last two years, and line them up from the lowest concentration to the highest. We then divide that list into five equal groups, or quintiles. We then see where the current pathogen abundance falls along that list. <ul><li>1st quintile, or bottom 20%: The pathogen levels are among the lowest historically seen at this site.</li><li>2nd quintile Levels are below the median for this site.</li><li>3rd quintile Levels are average/median for this site.</li><li>4th quintile Levels are above the median for this site.</li><li>5th quintile, or top 20%: The pathogen levels are among the highest historically seen at this site.</li></ul>This method provides context for the current data. For example, a result in the 5th quintile means current abundance is higher than that in 80% of the samples collected at this location over the past two years. If a site is new and lacks sufficient history, we temporarily use a national benchmark to make this comparison.

Abundance helps us categorize pathogen nucleic acid concentration levels. We then analyze data to determine the direction, or trend, of pathogen levels.<ul><li>Upward: There is a statistically significant increase in pathogen levels over the last three weeks.</li><li>Downward: There is a statistically significant decrease in pathogen levels over the last three weeks.</li><li>No trend: The levels are stable, or the data is not clear enough to point a direction.</li></ul>Three data points in the previous 21-day period are required to calculate a trend.

To learn more about how Verily produces near real-time data from our wastewater tests, visit the <a href='/solutions/sightline/wastewater' target='_self'> Wastewater overview page.</a>

NoteInformation provided on this dashboard is part of a project for frequent wastewater testing. Data has been collected from population sources in areas near to where matches will be held or teams will be hosted and may not reflect disease transmission in the broader community. Please look to your state or local health authority for information on what to do about pathogen concentrations in your own community.  This website is designed for informational and educational purposes only. Individuals should not use it for diagnosing or treating a health problem or disease. It is not a substitute for professional care. If you suspect you have a health problem, contact your healthcare provider. The creators of this site do not represent or endorse the accuracy, currency or reliability of any of the information, content, products, or advertisements contained on, distributed through, or linked, downloaded, or accessed from this site. Neither Verily, Your Local Epidemiologist, nor local health departments shall be liable for any damages, expenses or costs, of any kind whatsoever, related to or arising from an individual’s use of the information contained herein. About this data Pathogen data will be updated to <a style='color:#C4CAD1; text-decoration:underline;' href='/event-monitoring/world-soccer-games#where-the-game' target='_self' rel='noopener noreferrer' aria-label='This wastewater monitoring result section'>this site</a>. Some of this data was collected as part of the WastewaterSCAN / SCAN project, a partnership between Stanford University, Emory University, and Verily. Wastewater is routinely monitored through the participation of wastewater treatment plants in various programs working with academic, commercial, and public health laboratories. All data utilized on this site are used under appropriate data use agreements

Frequently asked questions (FAQs) regarding data from Verily Sightline Wastewater monitoring for World Soccer 2026 event.