Coastal SEES Collaborative Research: Integration of human behavior and perception into a risk-based microbial water quality management approach

暴露于与废水有关的病原体导致数百万例疾病，每年在全世界造成120亿美元的经济负担。因为世界上90%的人？由于生活废水未经消毒就进入环境，沿海海滩经常受到废水污染，这会极大地影响在海滩游泳和玩耍的人们的健康。 尽管科学进步，沿海水质监测方法依赖于过时的合规做法，无法准确识别公共卫生风险。该项目将直接测量病原体浓度，并确定使个人面临沿海用水疾病风险的行为。这些风险将从文化和生物的角度进行量化和评估，随后用于建议社会变革，以促进人类健康和沿海生态系统的可持续性。这项创新研究将通过确定可能使人们接触废水中病原体的做法，改善热带地区的可持续水管理方法，并建议经济和社会可行的干预措施，以最大限度地减少人类健康风险，从而推进NSF沿海SEES计划的目标。 该项目将吸引包括社区成员、国家政府和国际组织在内的许多不同的利益攸关方参与，以有效地改善沿海水资源管理。社区和K-12教育将通过创建双语，沿海水质模块和致力于改善水质的跨学科研究社区得到促进，将通过三名研究生，十二名本科生和一名博士后研究员的培训扩大。该项目是第一个使用整体水管理方法（结合卫生调查，有针对性的水质分析和定量微生物风险评估）来表征微生物水质和相关疾病风险的项目，该方法结合了人种学和流行病学研究，为微生物风险评估提供信息和验证。超越简单的终点风险评估，研究人员将使用探索性定量微生物风险评估来展示如何提高当地对沿海娱乐风险的理解和建立知识，再加上适当的技术和社会干预措施，可以改善微生物水质管理和公共卫生在地方，区域甚至全球层面。将与已确定的政府和非政府利益攸关方合作，从战略角度向地方和区域的个人宣传所建议的社会变革。该项目将以受污染的哥斯达黎加Jacó海滩为示范系统，通过确定热带地区经改进的家庭废水污染指标，实施一种新的水质管理综合办法，并纳入人类活动和观念在减轻微生物致病风险方面发挥的关键作用，为加强全世界沿海微生物水管理提供战略。

Exposure to wastewater-related pathogens results in millions of cases of illness and an economic burden of 12 billion USD annually worldwide. Since 90 percent of the world?s household wastewater enters the environment without being disinfected, coastal beaches are often polluted by wastewater, which can greatly impact the health of people that swim and play at the beach. Despite scientific advancements, coastal water quality monitoring approaches rely on outdated compliance practices that do not accurately identify public health risks. This project will directly measure pathogen concentrations and identify behaviors that put individuals at risk of illness from coastal water use. These risks will be quantified and assessed from cultural and biological perspectives, and subsequently used to recommend societal changes that promote benefits to human health and the sustainability of coastal ecosystems. This innovative study will advance the goals of the NSF Coastal SEES program by identifying practices that might expose people to pathogens in wastewater, improving sustainable water management approaches in the tropics, and recommending economically- and socially-feasible interventions to minimize human health risks. This project will engage many different stakeholders including community members, national governments, and international organizations in order to effectively initiate improvements in coastal water management. Community and K-12 education will be promoted through the creation of bilingual, coastal water quality modules and the interdisciplinary research community dedicated to improving water quality will be expanded through the training of three graduate students, twelve undergraduate students, and one postdoctoral researcher. This project is the first to characterize microbial water quality and associated risk of illness using a holistic water management approach (combination of sanitary surveys, targeted water quality analyses, and quantitative microbial risk assessment), which incorporates ethnographic and epidemiological studies to inform and validate microbial risk assessments. Going beyond simple, end-point risk assessments, the researchers will use exploratory quantitative microbial risk assessment to demonstrate how advancing local understanding and building knowledge regarding risk from coastal recreation can, when coupled with appropriate technological and social interventions, improve microbial water quality management and public health at a local, regional, and even global level. In collaboration with identified governmental and non-governmental stakeholders, the recommended societal changes will be strategically communicated to individuals locally and regionally. Using the polluted Costa Rican Jacó beach as a model system, this project will provide strategies to enhance coastal microbial water management worldwide by identifying improved household-wastewater pollution indicators for tropical regions, implementing an emerging holistic approach to water quality management, and incorporating the critical roles that human activities and perception play in mitigating microbial risk of illness.