Solid Evidence
solidevidence.bsky.social
Solid Evidence
@solidevidence.bsky.social
Molecular virologist, sewage sage and wastewater wizard.

Professor at University of Missouri, School of Medicine

So far there has only been one US patient reported with BA.3.2.

Meanwhile, these are the wastewater detections to date.

Want to know what's really going on? Check the wastewater; we don't miss shit.
January 28, 2026 at 6:01 PM
More zoo creatures. We’ve detected 3 different penguin species across our 12 sampling sites.

The first site was Boise, where we detected a banded penguin (matches Humboldt, African, or Magellanic).
1/
January 26, 2026 at 8:20 PM
I missed this, there is a second site (Boston) where Hippos showed up in our data, but there it was pygmy hippopotamus.

Checks out, apparently they have a colony at the New England zoo in Boston.
January 26, 2026 at 2:57 PM
We've made some updates to our dashboard if you want to check it out.

Influenza C is having a strong year.
dholab.github.io/public_viz/0...
January 25, 2026 at 7:27 PM
We found a new (I think) cryptic lineage this week.
I know I say this all the time, but this is really weird.
Warning, this thread is for nerds only.
1/
January 24, 2026 at 7:48 PM
This is cool, the KC zoo only has 1 or 2 hippos, but we've detected them in KC wastewater 9 times.

Usually I get in trouble when I talk about detecting individuals from wastewater, I hope they don't feel like I've invaded their privacy.
January 24, 2026 at 6:09 PM
It's a slow but persistent wave.

22 more wastewater detections of BA.3.2 (including ALL recent samples form RI). It's staring to be the dominant lineage in many cases.

I think the score on wastewater vs patient surveillance is now 44-to-1
January 22, 2026 at 1:19 PM
Who knew? This confused me.

The second most prevalent fish in Palo Alto wastewater is Largemouth bass.

I kept trying to find the lab that was using it for toxicology studies or something, but I was barking up the wrong tree.

1/
dholab.github.io/public_viz/0...
January 19, 2026 at 6:00 PM
I'm behind, I didn't realize that the H5N1 in Wisconsin dairy cattle last month was actually D1.1.

That means that there have been at least 3 independent spillovers into dairy cattle in the last 2+ years.

1/
www.avma.org/news/wildlif...
Wildlife likely spread H5N1 to Wisconsin dairy herd
The U.S. Department of Agriculture has confirmed highly pathogenic avian influenza (type A H5N1) in a Wisconsin dairy herd via a distinct D1.1 genotype from wildlife spillover. Unlike the common B3.13...
www.avma.org
January 19, 2026 at 5:29 PM
Seven more detections of BA.3.2 from US wastewater.

It's fanning out, this week it includes detections in CA, UT, and NYC.
January 7, 2026 at 7:31 PM
BA.3.2 update. It’s picking up speed.

7 new US wastewater detections in the last week, mostly from New England.
1/
January 1, 2026 at 5:54 PM
We've now had 7 consecutive sequencing plates where we detected Measles somewhere, and they are all independent.
December 30, 2025 at 9:36 PM
This is kind of unexpected.

There's been a big December surge in enterovirus D68 in every single West coast sewershed we track (mostly CA and including a few not listed), but nowhere else in the country.

Everywhere else there was a surge in Fall that has since died out.
December 28, 2025 at 10:02 PM
Another BA.3.2. This time from Dulles airport on Dec 7.
December 24, 2025 at 8:47 PM
Three more BA.3.2 wastewater detections this week. Rhode Island, New Hampshire, and California.

Wastewater: 8
Patient detections: 0
December 17, 2025 at 9:46 PM
We've been doing wastewater metagenomics for 2 years.

In the first 20 months we never detected measles once.

However, in the last 4 months we've detected it 10 times across numerous states.

It's going endemic again; good reason to get vaccinated.

health.hawaii.gov/news/newsroo...
DOH MONITORING FIRST WASTEWATER DETECTION OF MEASLES IN KAUAʻI COUNTY
HONOLULU — The Hawaiʻi Department of Health (DOH) is monitoring a positive wastewater sample for measles virus, the first wastewater detection of the virus for Kauaʻi County. The sample was collected ...
https://health.hawaii.gov/news/newsroom/doh-monitoring-first-wastewater-detection-of-measles-in-kauaʻi-county/
December 16, 2025 at 5:29 PM
Got the sniffles, Parainfluenzavirus 2 is having a big year. [one of many common cold viruses]

Curious, it was virtually absent last year.
December 16, 2025 at 5:23 PM
Three more BA.3.2 detections from US wastewater. Rhode Island (different sewershed, but near the previous one), Vermont, and Florida. All from CDC NWSS data.

Looks like it might be getting a foothold in New England.
@snpoehlm.bsky.social @ryanhisner.bsky.social @siamosolocani.bsky.social
December 11, 2025 at 7:07 PM
Does anyone know what strain of H5N1 is responsible for the most recent poultry outbreaks, particularly in Indiana? D.1.1 I presume?
December 7, 2025 at 2:59 PM
I agree. Wasn't sure before, but I think BA.3.2 is probably going to start accelerating.
One thing we've consistently seen is that if an emerging divergent variant competes evenly w/the most advanced circulating variants, it will eventually predominate. We saw this with XBB & BA.2.86, and a similar pattern holds among various minor lineages. 1/3
Seven new BA.3.2.2 from Germany today spotted by @JosetteSchoenma. They are genetically dispersed and are therefore clearly not a cluster. As @snpoehlm says, this is ~5% of all sequences and ~15% in North Rhine-Westphalia. Collection dates Nov 6-18.

One has a very interesting RBD mutation... 1/2
December 5, 2025 at 6:04 PM
Informal poll:

A few years ago we tracked down a cryptic lineage through wastewater, but at the time we didn't know they were coming from people.

1/
December 4, 2025 at 8:27 PM
Another US wastewater detection of BA.3.2.2 (from CDC-NWSS surveillance)

This time from Austin on 11/19

The score:
Wastewater 2
Patient surveillance 0
December 3, 2025 at 5:40 PM
I’ve got another wastewater mystery.
This one from Southern California, and it’s pretty fishy.
1/
December 2, 2025 at 12:56 AM
The Nebraska cryptic lineage appeared again this week. It really puts BA.3.2.2 in perspective.
November 28, 2025 at 3:32 PM
Another US BA.3.2 wastewater detection.

This time from Bristol County, RI on Nov 11. It was about a third of the seqs.

I wonder if it was someone who flew back from Australia through SF?
@ryanhisner.bsky.social @snpoehlm.bsky.social @rajlabn.bsky.social
November 26, 2025 at 11:01 PM