ST PAUL, Minn. — A statewide pilot project is expanding wastewater surveillance to help detect the measles virus and it's already showing a lot of potential.

"We can look at the whole population's wastewater and potentially detect if there's even one person that's present in the community that could be transmitting measles to others," said Stephanie Meyer, senior epidemiologist with the Minnesota Department of Health.

Meyer says MDH is working with the University of Minnesota to expand on its groundbreaking wastewater surveillance network that helped detect spikes in COVID transmission before hospitals saw a surge in patients. In recent years, the same sampling has also helped monitor flu and RSV transmission.

Earlier this year, a national network expanded the surveillance to include t

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