Taking on a Pandemic

Ryan Honeyman The Department of Bioinformatics draws wastewater samples from 20 campus buildings, primarily residence halls, several times weekly to test for the presence of COVID-19, making possible the identification of the presence of the virus among building residents prior to the onset of symptoms.

An integrated system of diagnostic and care services help control COVID-19 on campus

BY SUSAN MESSINA

Sampling and testing wastewater from the training campus-based contact tracers — is that it sewer lines leading to UNC Charlotte’s was developed and is being managed entirely by residence halls is by no means a glamorous UNC Charlotte faculty, staff and students,” said process, but it’s vital to the multi-department, Rick Tankersley, vice chancellor for Research and interdisciplinary — and largely successful — effort Economic Development. “Everyone has rallied to control the presence and spread of COVID-19 — during a crisis that has no roadmap — to lend this fall on UNC Charlotte’s campus. their expertise and do what’s best for the entire

“Most impressive about this probable once- campus community.” in-a-lifetime endeavor — from wastewater Planning started last summer as colleges and collection and analysis to setting up and operating universities nationwide grappled with deciding a coronavirus test clinic and test-processing lab, whether or not to open their campuses as ordering equipment and supplies, and hiring and COVID-19 continued to elude public health

professionals and government leaders. With a decision at UNC Charlotte to start classes online and delay a limited student move-in until late September, the University gained a few extra weeks to implement, in collaboration with the Mecklenburg County Health Department, a plan of action whose numerous and interconnected components were coordinated predominantly by the University’s Office of Safety and Security.

“Overall, UNC Charlotte students, faculty and staff have complied with the preventive protocols in place, such as following social distancing guidelines, wearing masks in the campus’s public spaces and using the hand sanitizing supplies available in all facilities,” said Robert Jones, M.D., the University’s medical director. “We knew, however, that to avoid a major outbreak of COVID-19, a robust and integrated clinical and administrative effort would be required. UNC Charlotte has risen to the occasion.”

Niner Health Check and Contact Tracing Every morning, students, faculty and staff receive a message with a link to Niner Health Check, a survey tool developed by UNC Charlotte’s Office of OneIT, which prompts respondents to report whether since the previous day they have been tested for, diagnosed with or have begun to experience symptoms of COVID-19, or had contact with a diagnosed individual. Depending on the answers, participants are instructed whether or not to come to campus, to be tested for COVID-19 or monitor symptoms from home.

“The survey tool initiates a series of services, protocols and actions designed to identify, locate, inform and care for those on campus affected directly by COVID-19,” said Patrick Versace, assistant vice chancellor for Enterprise Applications. “With an overall 98% compliance rate regarding the survey, we can be confident that Niner Health Check is making a difference on UNC Charlotte’s campuses.”

Those who indicate exposure or a diagnosis are instructed to begin quarantine or isolation, including resident students who move to designated spaces on campus where their health needs are addressed and meals are delivered. University contact tracers, led by Keith Carnes ’07 MHA, ’16 Ph.D., research assistant professor in the Department of Public Health Sciences, are alerted to begin the process of determining who had close proximity to the infected person and communicate with them to determine if testing or quarantine is appropriate. His team includes master’s and doctoral students from the public health sciences program that have been trained to conduct these investigations.

NiCole Lynch The Office of Safety and Security, led by Associate Vice Chancellor John Bogdan (standing), manages logistical details related to mitigating COVID-19 on campus, including tracking faculty, staff and students who are tested and in quarantine or isolation for daily dashboard updates.

COVID-19 Test Clinic and Processing Lab Medical personnel from the Student Health Center (SHC) have worked most of the fall semester in a large tent set up near the SHC for the singular purpose of administering COVID-19 tests to faculty, staff and students instructed to get them based on their Niner Health Check results. They also regularly test several 49ers teams (in collaboration with an outside vendor that manages the rest). Tests conducted there are transported to a lab in Cameron Hall that has been upfitted — and for which federal CLIA (Clinical Laboratory Improvement Amendments) certification has been obtained to process human samples — to run up to several hundred tests per day, if needed. Additionally, the lab team, in collaboration with OneIT, installed software programs designed to support clinical and laboratory workflow, laboratory outreach, point-of-care testing, data analytics and HIPAA security.

“There was a University-wide willingness to create a COVID-19 test processing lab to provide fast, accurate and timely results, especially with the supply chain challenges that hospitals and testing facilities across the country have experienced,” said Angelica Martins, interim director, Research and Economic Development, who directs the COVID-19 Testing Center.

Niner Health Check, a daily digital survey tool that asks Niners to report on their health status, was developed by OneIT’s Jason Dominiczak, a solution architect who also created the COVID-19 website dashboard and a digital tool that allowed campus community members to attest to whether or not they’d had a flu shot.

Kat Lawrence Cynthia Gibas from Bioinformatics and Mariya Munir from Civil and Environmental Engineering test collected wastewater in labs located in the Bioinformatics building and EPIC. All protocols and facilities for their work meet guidelines of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Wastewater Surveillance System.

Wastewater Sampling and Testing UNC Charlotte is one of several institutions nationwide to invest in campus-based wastewater testing, which involves extracting samples from the sewer lines leading to 28 campus locations, primarily residence halls, either manually or by autosampler, a process that serves as a coronavirus early-warning system.

“Traces of the virus in wastewater precedes the onset of symptoms in individuals,” said Cynthia Gibas, bioinformatics researcher, who is leading the project with Environmental Engineer Mariya Munir, whose expertise includes the quantitative detection of DNA/RNA. “Working closely with Facilities Management, we are able to pinpoint the presence of COVID-19 in a particular building, which can expedite the process of identifying infected individuals.”

This broad based, multi-college undertaking, which meets guidelines set by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Wastewater Surveillance Program, includes expertise provided by faculty and postdoctoral researchers from the Department of Bioinformatics and Genomics, the Department Civil and Environmental Engineering, the Department of Geography and Earth Sciences, the Department of Computer Science and the Department of Public Health Sciences.

N.C. General Assembly appropriates funds for COVID-19 research at UNC Charlotte

This fall, the North Carolina General Assembly appropriated $9 million in CARES (Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security) Act funding to UNC Charlotte for groundbreaking COVID-19 research. This investment represents the largest research appropriation to the University.

Legislative interest in this project aligned with Chancellor Sharon L. Gaber’s focus to apply research and data to the reopening of campus safely this fall in light of the COVID-19 pandemic. Her approach follows the leadership of her predecessors James H. Woodward, whose vision launched the University’s bioinformatics program now leading campus efforts to test wastewater at several locations, and Philip L. Dubois, whose commitment to academics and research led to their significant growth.

Championed by Rep. Jason Saine ’97 of Lincoln County, who serves as co-chair of Appropriations, and Rep. Becky Carney of Mecklenburg County, who is a co-chair of the House Select Committee on COVID-19 Health Care Working Group, the effort received wide bipartisan support. Legislators readily acknowledged that the University is focused on innovative research and practical solutions that address today’s problems and enable the

Rep. Becky Carney

Rep. Jason Saine development of healthier communities for the future.

Rep. Saine stated, “I can’t express how proud I am of UNC Charlotte. The world is learning what alumni already know. That our school is a top-notch university and that our research is meaningful and really can impact people’s daily lives. To see our University’s work on COVID-19 solutions get the needed funding it deserves is more validation for the work already happening on campus as well as what lies ahead. Already, this research has been noted nationally and I couldn’t be more proud to be associated with this investment.”

“Over the years, I have seen the research at UNC Charlotte grow and solve important problems and issues in our community. I was proud to urge my colleagues from across the state to include this project in the COVID-19 package,” Rep. Carney added.

Wastewater testing, in its current application within a college campus environment, allows the University to analyze the effectiveness of this approach in a congregate living setting. Legislators recognize that the findings of this research could be applicable to towns, cities and counties for similar investigations at a neighborhood level as well as to K-12 or similar settings to foresee and abate outbreaks.

An up-to-the-minute COVID-19 Dashboard An online dashboard designed cooperatively by the Office of Emergency Management and the Office of OneIT provides information to the wider community about UNC Charlotte’s COVID-19 status. Updated daily with data provided by multiple sources (with the exception of on-campus testing statistics, which occurs weekly), the dashboard offers a timely illustration of health trends on campus.

“We’re committed to keeping the public informed about new cases reported daily and the number of active cases at any given time,” said Chris Gonyar ’05, ’07 MPA, director of Emergency Management. (Visit the dashboard: emergency.uncc.edu/covid-19-dashboard.)

On the safe side At various times this fall, the University made a decision to initiate surge testing and surveillance testing, additional strategies designed to preempt outbreaks. The purpose of both types is to sample the campus community to identify possible asymptomatic cases and to monitor for increasing or decreasing prevalence of the virus. Surge testing involves testing everyone in a determined environment, such as in a residence hall or on a sports team, whereas surveillance testing is random.

“The response to surge testing and surveillance testing on campus has been strikingly positive,” said Tankersley. “While faculty and staff have done a tremendous job of creating systems that are contributing to what appears to be a successful fall semester in terms of controlling COVID-19 on campus, the majority of the students are doing their part to keep themselves and other Niners as safe as possible. We anticipate a similar level of shared understanding and cooperation for the remainder of the 202021 academic year.”

Susan Messina is director of News & Information for University Communications

The New York Times ran a front page story on Aug. 30 that featured details about UNC Charlotte’s wastewater sampling and testing protocols. The story reported the efforts of universities nationwide to develop ways to open and operate safely during the coronavirus pandemic.

Kat Lawrence Chancellor Sharon L. Gaber, left, toured the Cameron Hall lab established for COVID-19 with Rick Tankersley, right, vice chancellor for Research and Economic Development (RED), and Angelica Martins, RED’s interim director.