The coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic is currently posing a significant threat to the world’s public health and social-economic growth. Despite the rigorous international lockdown and quarantine efforts, the rate of COVID-19 infectious cases remains exceptionally high. Notwithstanding, the end route of COVID-19, together with emerging contaminants’ (antibiotics, pharmaceuticals, nanoplastics, pesticide, etc.) occurrence in wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs), poses a great challenge in wastewater settings. Therefore, this paper seeks to review an inter-disciplinary and technological approach as a roadmap for the water and wastewater settings to help fight COVID-19 and future waves of pandemics. This study explored wastewater–based epidemiology (WBE) potential for detecting SARS-CoV-2 and its metabolites in wastewater settings. Furthermore, the prospects of integrating innovative and robust technologies such as magnetic nanotechnology, advanced oxidation process, biosensors, and membrane bioreactors into the WWTPs to augment the risk of COVID-19’s environmental impacts and improve water quality are discussed. In terms of the diagnostics of COVID-19, potential biosensors such as sample–answer chip-, paper- and nanomaterials-based biosensors are highlighted. In conclusion, sewage treatment systems, together with magnetic biosensor diagnostics and WBE, could be a possible way to keep a surveillance on the outbreak of COVID-19 in communities around the globe, thereby identifying hotspots and curbing the diagnostic costs of testing. Photocatalysis prospects are high to inactivate coronavirus, and therefore a focus on safe nanotechnology and bioengineering should be encouraged.

中文翻译：

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COVID-19 在废水系统中发生的命运：新兴检测和处理技术——综述

冠状病毒 (COVID-19) 大流行目前对世界公共卫生和社会经济增长构成重大威胁。尽管国际上采取了严格的封锁和隔离措施，但 COVID-19 感染病例的发生率仍然异常高。尽管如此，COVID-19 的最终途径以及废水处理厂 (WWTP) 中出现的新兴污染物（抗生素、药物、纳米塑料、农药等）对废水环境构成了巨大挑战。因此，本文试图回顾一种跨学科和技术方法，作为水和废水环境的路线图，以帮助对抗 COVID-19 和未来的大流行浪潮。本研究探索了基于废水的流行病学 (WBE) 检测废水环境中 SARS-CoV-2 及其代谢物的潜力。此外，讨论了将磁性纳米技术、高级氧化工艺、生物传感器和膜生物反应器等创新和稳健技术整合到污水处理厂以增加 COVID-19 环境影响风险和改善水质的前景。在 COVID-19 的诊断方面，突出了潜在的生物传感器，例如基于样本-应答芯片、纸和纳米材料的生物传感器。总之，污水处理系统与磁性生物传感器诊断和 WBE 相结合，可能成为监测全球社区 COVID-19 爆发的一种可能方式，从而确定热点并控制检测的诊断成本。光催化灭活冠状病毒的前景广阔，因此应鼓励关注安全的纳米技术和生物工程。