COVID-19 wastewater viral activity in Arkansas has increased from “minimal” to “moderate” to “high” from June 8 to June 22 according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s wastewater surveillance data, which has been a reliable early warning system for COVID surges.
The CDC’s National Wastewater Surveillance System compiles and standardizes data from wastewater treatment plants all over the country into a single database that shows the presence of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, in wastewater.
COVID testing data has become less meaningful since the early days of the pandemic, as the number of people seeking out tests has declined. Many people now test themselves at home with over-the-counter kits, the results of which are not reported to public health authorities. That means surveillance metrics such as wastewater data are all the more important to provide a picture of disease spread within a community, according to the CDC. The database is updated every Friday and currently includes data through June 24.
“We found that wastewater surveillance is extremely effective in giving us an early warning of increases,” said Dr. Amy Kirby, CDC’s National Wastewater Surveillance System team leader. “It’s detecting cases that are already in the community, but earlier than we see them in other surveillance systems.”
Arkansas, one of 14 states with high-or-greater viral activity right now, has nine wastewater treatment plants that report data to the CDC.
Four plants are in Pulaski County and two are in Boone County. Garland, Greene and Benton counties each have a plant. Viral activity levels appear to be increasing everywhere, to varying degrees.
While the levels are increasing, Kirby said Arkansas’s wastewater data tends to fluctuate due to the small number of sites and the fact they’ve only recently started reporting data.
“It’s important to note that two of those nine sites, about a quarter of them, have less than six months of data,” Kirby said.
To determine a site’s current level of viral activity, researchers typically compare the amount of virus present to the numbers collected at that site over the previous year. When a site has only a few months of data, Kirby said, “it can be more noisy.”
Six months into 2024, Arkansas has so far had 1,866 hospitalizations due to COVID, according to the Arkansas Department of Health. The number of hospitalizations has declined each year since 2021.
The state health department’s COVID-19 Data Hub, updated June 26, shows a decrease in COVID-19 hospitalizations and deaths since the start of 2024.
The health department does not track positive tests, active COVID-19 cases or wastewater data — only hospitalizations and deaths.
According to the CDC’s COVID Data Tracker, updated June 22, test positivity has increased by 1.4% across the U.S., emergency department visits increased by 23.3% and deaths increased by 14.3% in the most recent week of data.
When Kirby first spoke to the Arkansas Times, Arkansas’s level of viral activity was considered moderate, according to wastewater data. After the most recent data was published and Arkansas moved up to high viral activity, a spokesperson for the CDC reached back out to recommend that people take steps to protect themselves and others from COVID-19.
“The very best protection out there for COVID is to get vaccinated,” Kirby said. “Looking at your community, if you start seeing increases, it’s always a good time to go and make sure that your vaccines are up to date.”
*An earlier version of this post included a quote given by Dr. Amy Kirby before the most recent wastewater data was released. It has been removed to avoid confusion.