ICC Water & Health meetings in June

In June 2023, there were two scientific symposia organized by ICC Water & Health.

In Darwin, Australia, the 21^st HRWM "Health-Related Water Microbiology" Symposium of the International Water Association (IWA) took place from June 4 to 9. Under the presidency of our ICC Water & Health co-leader Prof. Regina Sommer, the ICC was represented by 8 delegates and 4 panel presentations on topics such as genetic methods for fecal pollution diagnostics, advanced metagenomics or quantitative risk analysis of waterborne pathogens. Prof. Andreas Farnleitner, together with ICC Water & Health members Dr. Katalin Demeter and Dr. Claudia Kolm, and Prof. Joan Rose from the University of Michigan, held a workshop on how genetic diagnostics of fecal contamination can be translated from science into practice and gain its acceptance by water utilities and government agencies worldwide.

On June 29, the first Water Quality and Health Symposium was held in Vienna in cooperation with AGES, the Austrian Agency for Health and Food Safety. In addition to guest lectures by representatives of the WHO and EU on new regulations in the assessment of bathing water quality, researchers from the ICC and AGES discussed current topics of water quality and health in the field of international challenges such as global warming, technology development or the spread of antibiotic resistance. The next event of this new collaboration will take place in 2 years.