Wastewater Surveillance Ethics Builder

The Wastewater Surveillance Ethics Builder is an interactive, modular tool designed to help researchers, public health officials, and policymakers identify ethical considerations when working with wastewater surveillance data.

Wastewater-based surveillance can be a powerful public health tool, especially in tracking disease outbreaks or environmental contaminants. However, it also raises important ethical questions about privacy, consent, data ownership, and community engagement. This tool provides tailored ethical guidance depending on the type of data you are working with.

Who should use this tool?

• Researchers conducting wastewater or environmental surveillance
• Public health departments
• Institutional review boards (IRBs) or ethics committees
• Data governance professionals
• Community advisory boards

How it works:
Users select the data type and context they are working with. The tool then generates relevant ethical considerations across multiple dimensions such as autonomy, privacy, benefit sharing, and governance.

Example:
If a user selects:

• DNA/RNA as the data type
• Sequence data as the description
• Human as the origin

The tool might generate the following summary of ethical considerations:

Potential benefits:
Limited to general knowledge about population structure or ancestry; possible identification of disease allele frequencies.

Potential harms:
Risk of community-level and personal privacy loss, stigma, or misrepresentation; ancestry studies could conflict with cultural beliefs or reinforce harmful stereotypes.

Autonomy and informed consent:
No individual consent for sequencing; community-level consent and engagement are critical.

Equity:
Meaningful engagement with local communities, ensuring culturally appropriate communication and fair representation in decision-making.

Benefit sharing:
Benefits may be unclear; material incentives must not coerce participation. Consider non-material or community-defined benefits.

Governance and oversight:
Ethics committee and institutional oversight required.

Data protection:
Highest level of data protection needed, particularly in absence of individual consent.

Data access:
Should remain aggregate and anonymized; future use requires oversight.

Legislation:
Must comply with data protection and privacy laws.

Health legislation:
Coordinate with local health authorities on findings relevant to public health.

Access the tool here:
👉 Wastewater Surveillance Ethics Builder