Our webinar answered common questions about following data for COVID-19 and other infectious diseases.
As one of the only newsrooms still reporting on the impact of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, we often get questions from readers about our weekly COVID-19 trends reports. What does it mean when a source says SARS-CoV-2 levels in wastewater are “low”? When can we expect seasonal waves to begin? Can we still trust data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)?
To answer those questions and assist our readers in finding and interpreting data on COVID-19 and other pathogens, The Sick Times held a free webinar on April 28, 2026.
The Sick Times co-founders Miles W. Griffis and Betsy Ladyzhets hosted the event. They were joined by Caitlin Rivers, an infectious disease epidemiologist who directs the Center for Outbreak Response Innovation at Johns Hopkins and runs the popular newsletter Force of Infection; and Tea Burns, a disabled trans nurse and first aid instructor with Action Readiness Collective of NYC (ARC-NYC).
We held the event during a lull between COVID-19 waves because we know that even though flu season has passed, COVID-19 spreads year-round.
COVID-19 data sources
Betsy opened the event by sharing some of the variety of sources she uses to write The Sick Times’ weekly U.S. COVID-19 data updates.
Wastewater surveillance data:
- CDC’s Wastewater Monitoring Program — A massive data collection program that compiles information from wastewater testing sites around the United States. Many of those sites are run by state and local public health departments that then report up to the CDC.
- WastewaterSCAN — An academic organization that started testing for SARS-CoV-2 in sewage early in the pandemic in California, and then expanded around the country. They have nearly 150 wastewater testing sites across 40 states.
- Biobot Analytics — A startup that’s also been doing COVID-19 wastewater surveillance since early in the pandemic.
Other data sources:
- CDC’s National Respiratory and Enteric Virus Surveillance System — A national network of labs that report PCR testing data to the CDC.
- CDC’s Current Epidemic Trends — Modeled estimates based on emergency department data.
- CovidPoops19 — A resource for finding other wastewater dashboards. It includes both government and academic efforts, and only reports testing sites where results are public.
- COVID-19 variant data: CDC Variants and Genomic Surveillance and Wastewater Data for COVID-19 Variants
- This shareable spreadsheet of wastewater data and other metrics from state and local dashboards, collected from state and local public health departments.
Other analysis:
Answering common questions
Following Betsy’s presentation, Miles moderated a Q&A with our panel of experts. Their answers have been summarized and condensed for clarity below. For full answers, please watch the video, or read the transcript (coming soon!). This event will also be adapted into an episode of our podcast, Still Here.
Are CDC data still trustworthy?
Caitlin: With the exception of the federal government shutdowns, when no data were published, I haven’t seen any political interference in the CDC’s COVID-19 data. The values that the CDC are reporting on their website are collected from all 56 public health jurisdictions, and those jurisdictions are publishing their own data on their own websites.
You can cross-check that what the CDC is reporting is the same as what each state is reporting. For respiratory viruses specifically, there are enough different ways to triangulate and double check that I can confirm and say with confidence that I have not seen evidence that the CDC data are not reliable.
What are the top sources for international wastewater data?
Caitlin: The U.K. (UKHSA data dashboard) and Canada (Canadian respiratory virus surveillance report) have great dashboards that I’m very familiar with, and they can often provide insights into what we can expect if we hear of an international trend that hasn’t reached the U.S. yet. Often the U.K. will have early reporting that helps me to anticipate what we’ll face in the weeks ahead. So I think that’s a great resource and they do really awesome work.
There are huge areas of the globe where almost no cases are reported, and that’s obviously an issue with the reporting itself and not with the disease.
There are huge areas of the globe where almost no cases are reported, and that’s obviously an issue with the reporting itself and not with the disease.
Caitlin Rivers, infectious disease epidemiologist
Will we continue to see COVID-19 surge multiple times per year? What would it take for it to stop?
Caitlin: We are seeing twice-yearly surges, one in late summer, one in the winter. This is unusual for respiratory pathogens. The others occur later in the fall into winter. We don’t really have any summer respiratory pathogens. So the summer COVID-19 wave is a surprise to me, even as an epidemiologist.
I don’t know what’s going to happen in the future, but because we have settled into this twice-annual summer wave bigger than winter pattern, that’s my expectation going forward and there’s no epidemiological reason why I would expect that to change.
Betsy: I also think that the variant piece is very important with this. A lot of experts who I was talking to back in 2021 when we started to see variants were surprised to see how fast the SARS-CoV-2 virus evolved. And it was kind of a big downer when everybody got vaccinated and we thought we would just have herd immunity and it would be fine.
Then suddenly Delta came on the scene and we had big waves again. And then Omicron also led to tons of infections when it first arrived. And so that adds to the unpredictability.
Tea: I think that only under socialized medicine and under a socialist society will we see trends going down. Under capitalism, [governments and businesses] have incentives to continue mass deaths and disablement because when you’re sick and disabled, they can still profit off your bodies through the healthcare system, through the nursing home system, etc.
How are you interpreting our current “low” levels of SARS-CoV-2?
Betsy: With WastewaterSCAN and Biobot Analytics, current levels are the lowest we’ve seen since spring 2022, right after the first big Omicron wave. And they’re approaching the lows that we saw in 2021, right after everybody had gotten vaccinated and there was a lot of immunity from the vaccinations. Also test positivity is the lowest I’ve seen in a couple of years.
Tea: This current low feels like a calm before the storm.
What do we know about the BA.3.2 variant (or “Cicada”) so far?
Caitlin: BA 3.2 a highly mutated variant. It’s very different from the previously circulating variants, but it doesn’t seem to cause more severe illness. And there’s some uncertainty about whether it’s more transmissible or evades immunity, which would cause it to really take root. But I haven’t really seen a lot of evidence that that’s playing out. It looks okay for now, but keep your fingers crossed.
Betsy: It’s also a little hard to tell just because there’s less PCR testing going on than there was a couple years ago, so that makes it a bit challenging to know exactly where this variant is right now. Cicada does seem to be increasing in prevalence, but the level of testing that is leading to those samples is much less comprehensive than it used to be. So it’s kind of tricky to draw major conclusions at this point.
What recommendations do you have for people who are interested in advocating for more COVID-19 safety measures in their communities or organizing spaces?
Tea: Even when local risk levels may be lower, there’s still good reason to mask up at any event. There’s airborne pollution, and there’s also operational security. Those are two big reasons why I personally still mask, in addition to the ongoing pandemic, which we talk about extensively in our zine, Something’s in the Air, published a little over a year ago.
Just because local risk levels may be lower, that doesn’t mean that people don’t get sick. People can still get sick, and it may not even be a SARS-CoV-2 infection, but it could be another respiratory pathogen. Masking up is still, for me, the standard because every time you mask up, every chain of transmission that you break is a life saved either from an immediate death, from an acute COVID-19 infection, or slow death via Long COVID and organized abandonment.
I highly recommend — especially if you are in so-called leftist/radical/revolutionary organizations or communities — to challenge your comrades to take health and disability as a serious site of class struggle.
It’s in our class interest to keep each other safe and well because this is what it means to be a good neighbor and a good comrade and a good relative to all the living beings that we share the earth with. It’s in our interest to keep each other alive and not disabled by Long COVID because when we’re disabled, we can’t fight for a better world, and it only serves our enemies when we weaponize arrogance and disable each other via COVID-19 and other infections.
I highly recommend — especially if you are in so-called leftist/radical/revolutionary organizations or communities — to challenge your comrades to take health and disability as a serious site of class struggle.
TEA burns, Action readiness collective of nyc
What other viruses have you been keeping an eye on recently?
Caitlin: It’s one of the worst tick-borne tick seasons in many years. I’m not an outdoorsy person, but I’ve already found two on me this year, so that goes to show that you have to be alert to the possibility of ticks even if you’re not really in a tick spot. So there’s always something going around. But thankfully right now, the big three major pathogens — COVID, flu, and RSV — have cooled off a little bit.
What are your thoughts on the current COVID-19 vaccine guidelines?
Caitlin: The previous recommendations before this most recent ACIP committee was once annually for healthy people, twice annually if you have an underlying health condition, especially including an immunocompromising condition that doesn’t exclude you from getting vaccinated, so it’s either once or twice a year. If you are forward-leaning with your health, I would consider getting vaccinated before the summer wave.
Right now, the schedule aligns flu and COVID-19 vaccinations. So the recommendation from the before-times is that you would get a flu vaccine in October, but that’s past the summer wave. And so earlier in summer would be more timely to get a second annual COVID shot.
I’ll just throw out one other thing: the composition of the vaccine for both flu and COVID-19 gets updated every year. Ideally, the purpose of the update is to reflect the variants that are going around, and that is timed for the fall distribution.
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