BECCA MALIZIAÂ
Biobot Analytics
I’m the Science Communications Manager for Biobot Analytics.
We came across a recent letter to the editor (Link) on tracking Covid in wastewater that mentioned Biobot, and we have a few comments we’d love to share:
- Los Alamos County is a participant in the CDC’s NWSS Program. This program is managed by Biobot, but funded by the CDC. Biobot is not receiving funds from Los Alamos County;
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Our variant data for Los Alamos County shows that the primary variant circulating is BA.5. For context, BF and BQ are subvariants of BA.5, which are included in the overall BA.5 percentage shown. This is consistent with the CDC’s Region 6 data, which shows that BQ, BF and BA.5 represent the majority of variants circulating in the region;
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Of note, we have also started reporting BF.7 at the regional and national level and will likely begin to report BQ.1 separately in the coming weeks. If interested, you may find more information in our variant report notes; and
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Finally, when comparing our variant data to the CDC’s variant data, it’s important to note that the way we report the data differs. For example, CDC’s Region 6 includes Arkansas, Louisiana, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Texas. In contrast, New Mexico is included in our Western Region (alongside twelve other states), and we also report at the county level for Los Alamos County, as linked above.
