Drinking Water & Health in Rural Appalachia
Start Year: 2020 | End Year: Ongoing
We are working on a number of projects to better understand issues related to drinking water (access, quality, use), sanitation, and health in the Appalachia region. In 2020, we started a comprehensive systematic review and meta-analysis study to identify and synthesize published research on drinking water contamination and associated health outcomes in the Appalachian region over a 20-year time period. We pre-registered our study protocols and completed data extraction and analysis in 2022; we anticipate publishing this work in 2023 (as of the end of 2022 our manuscript was under review). In collaboration with UVA, ETSU, and others, we are also conducting two, small-scale, water-and-health focused prospective cohort studies in southwest VA. In 2022, we published initial findings from one of these studies (focused on a small community in one county), and we anticipate publishing preliminary findings from the other, larger-scale, study (households across two counties) in 2023. Given the relatively high rates of household bottled water use/reliance we observed, we are also conducting an additional study to analyze water quality parameters in bottled water sold in big-box and grocery stores in the region; we also anticipate publishing those findings in 2023.
Funding & Support
Poverty, Water, Climate Change, & Health in Sub-Saharan Africa
Start Year: 2020 | End Year: Ongoing
As described below (see other project summaries), the Multidimensional Poverty Assessment Tool (MPAT) was created in two phases (from 2008 to 2014) via a collaborative, international initiative to develop, test, and pilot a new tool for local-level rural poverty assessment. The work was guided by a Sounding Board of experts from the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), other United Nations agencies, international and regional organizations, and universities around the world (see www.ifad.org/mpat). Following MPAT’s finalization and institutionalization in 2014, it was used in multiple countries including many in Sub-Saharan Africa. We are currently working on multiple desk-based studies with a variety of collaborators to analyze data from ~7,000 households across Eswatini, Kenya, Lesotho, Mali, Tanzania, and Zimbabwe. Because MPAT was developed based primarily on data from Bangladesh, China, India, and Mozambique, one study we are leading is an updated assessment and evaluation of MPAT’s indicator structure and robustness based on its use in the sub-Saharan region. Other studies we are working on focus on a cross-county analyses of MPAT’s water, climate change, and health focused components and sub-components, and related programs and interventions. We anticipate publishing a number of papers on this research in 2023 and 2024.
Funding & Support
Wastewater Surveillance & Epidemiology at Multiple Scales
Start Year: 2020 | End Year: Ongoing
Our group is working on a number of wastewater focused research projects. Over the 2020/21 academic year, Dr.s Pruden & Vikesland (pictured) in Environmental Engineering led an initiative with collaborators across Virginia Tech (and at HRSD) to collect and analyze wastewater samples from different buildings and sites across the university campus with the goal of developing a coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19) surveillance program. Wastewater surveillance has been used by many other research groups, as well as wastewater utilities, to monitor SARS-CoV-2 (i.e., the virus that causes COVID-19) trends. Our primary research objective for that study was to evaluate the use of wastewater-based surveillance and epidemiologic methods to monitor and predict SARS-CoV-2 virus trends at sub-sewershed scales. Using pre-specified methods, our analyses showed that the detection of SARS-CoV-2 genes in wastewater samples was associated with statistically significant increases in COVID-19 cases 8 days after sample collection. We published our methods and findings from this research in 2022 and continue to collaborate and expand on this work in other settings. Starting in 2020, our group also supported wastewater surveillance efforts led by colleagues at the Virginia Department of Health (Dr. Degen) the Roanoke Health District, UVA (Dr. Taniuchi), and Radford University (Dr. Tolliver). In the summer of 2022, our research group (in collaboration with other VT faculty, students, and Dr. Taniuchi’s group at UVA) initiated a new wastewater surveillance and epidemiology study in collaboration with a wastewater utility in southwest VA; we started a monthly sub-sewershed sampling campaign in September 2022, and anticipate publishing initial findings from this project by/before 2024.
Funding & Support
Wastewater & Coastal Environmental Health in the Philippines
Start Year: 2018 | End Year: 2022
This research collaboration between colleagues at the University of California Berkeley (UCB) and the University of the Philippines (UPD) was designed to advance methods for measuring, modelling, and assessing marine water quality and environmental health at three sites in the Philippines. One of the three study sites for this multi-year project is Boracay Island. A popular tourist destination, in recent years sewage and other contaminants have adversely impacted Boracay’s beaches and coastal water quality, with implications for both environmental and human health. This research project centers on the use of an autonomous surface vessel to collect a wide range of spatially referenced data which can be combined with data from water samples and lab-based analyses, as well as satellite and other remote sensed data. At the Boracay site, proxy sensor data (e.g., optical brighteners and tryptophan) and laboratory analyses of grab samples will be combined to map and model actual and estimated water quality and environmental health impacts from point and non-point runoff and wastewater effluent. Our planned research activities and associated timelines suffered from a variety of logistical setbacks and delays, as well as delays related to the COVID-19 Pandemic. We anticipate publishing findings from this work starting in 2023.
Funding & Support
Refinement & Finalization of the Multidimensional Poverty Assessment Tool (MPAT)
Start Year: 2010 | End Year: 2014
Following the release of the working-paper User’s Guide for the Multidimensional Poverty Assessment Tool (MPAT) in 2009, a number of agencies and universities used the beta-version of MPAT in a variety of settings. In order to finalize MPAT and develop a comprehensive User’s Guide and associated resources, we built on the lessons learned from early adopters of the the tool (e.g., an NGO in Kenya) and iteratively used and evaluated the tool with IFAD-supported projects in Bangladesh and Mozambique. Details on the participatory expert elicitation methods we used are provided in a Journal of Development Studies paper. We developed an Excel-based data entry platform so users could easily calculate MPAT’s indicators at household, village, and project levels. We also wrote a comprehensive, 300+ page, 2014 MPAT User’s Guide which provides step-by-step instructions for using MPAT as well as training modules and materials, all with the goal of making MPAT an accessible open-source tool. The User’s Guide and accompanying resources were presented at a 2014 launch event in Rome. Since its 2014 release, MPAT has been translated into a number of languages, an optional 11th component focused on climate change was added, and MPAT has been used by a variety of agencies and institutions around the world. MPAT publications and related resources are available at www.ifad.org/mpat.
Funding & Support
Developing a Thematic Indicator for Rural Poverty Assessment (MPAT)
Start Year: 2008 | End Year: 2009
The Multidimensional Poverty Assessment Project was a collaborative, international initiative to develop, test, and pilot a new tool for local-level rural poverty assessment. The work was supported by IFAD and guided by a Sounding Board of experts from IFAD, other United Nations agencies, international and regional organizations, and universities around the world, with the majority of its members coming from the Asia region where we developed and tested the tool in China and India. Surveys (household and village level) were developed and tested in an iterative and participatory fashion, as was the indicator structure used to aggregate sub-components and components. The resulting Multidimensional Poverty Assessment Tool (MPAT) provides an assessment, an overview, of ten dimensions central to rural livelihoods, highlighting where additional support or interventions are likely to be most needed. The tool was designed to be universal enough to be relevant to most rural contexts around the world, yet specific enough to provide project managers and others a detailed overview of key dimensions relevant to rural poverty reduction efforts. MPAT was independently evaluated by the European Commission Joint Research Center and a working-paper version of MPAT User’s Guide was released in 2009 as well as the 2009 MPAT Book, which provides a detailed description of why and how the tool was developed. MPAT’s theoretical foundations are described in a 2010 article in Development and Practice.
Funding & Support
