Publicação
Environmental Water as a Source of Fungal Infections
| dc.contributor.author | Brandão, João | |
| dc.date.accessioned | 2026-02-09T11:10:58Z | |
| dc.date.available | 2026-02-09T11:10:58Z | |
| dc.date.issued | 2025-04-20 | |
| dc.description.abstract | Objectives: The emergence of Candida auris has drawn international attention within the Fungi community, particularly in the context of environmental and occupational health, water management, and research. Currently, wastewater analysis is not limited to COVID-19 investigation but also encompasses other microbial factors like C. auris and Aspergillus fumigatus sensu stricto. The World Health Organization (WHO) addressed fungal taxa in its 2021 recreational water quality management guidelines, recognizing their significance. To enhance human health protection, these guidelines recommend monitoring beach sand for both bacterial indicators of fecal pollution and all fungi as a reflection of contamination levels, indicating the potential exposure of beachgoers to these microorganisms. In 2022, WHO reinforced the need to monitor fungi in national and supranational regulations, introducing a watch list of fungi of interest. Furthermore, Europe updated its Drinking Water Directive and proposed, in a side document designed to help Member-states implement the revised directive (state-of-play) the monitoring of fungi in public buildings used by immunocompromised patients, including hospitals and nursing homes. The objective of this communication is to outline an overview of the current trends of fungal analysis in water environments. Methods: Overview on international policy regulating the presence of fungi in water environments (drinking water, wastewater, coastal and inland recreational water, beach sand). Results: Fungi are missing from all regulation except drinking water in Sweden thus far. The WHO Guidelines for recreational quality recommend looking into fungi, where of relevance, and always on sand. Wastewater and environmental surveillance global initiative (Glowacon) has included fungi in its pathogen list. Conclusions: The recent developments on and categorisation of fungi have paved the way for the inclusion of fungi in water quality regulation, whether for drinking or recreational or wastewater. | eng |
| dc.identifier.uri | http://hdl.handle.net/10400.18/10843 | |
| dc.language.iso | eng | |
| dc.peerreviewed | yes | |
| dc.rights.uri | http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ | |
| dc.subject | Fungi | |
| dc.subject | Sand Quality | |
| dc.subject | Water | |
| dc.subject | Antifungals | |
| dc.subject | Water Environments | |
| dc.subject | Agentes Microbianos e Ambiente | |
| dc.subject | Água e Solo | |
| dc.title | Environmental Water as a Source of Fungal Infections | eng |
| dc.type | conference object | |
| dspace.entity.type | Publication | |
| oaire.citation.conferenceDate | 2025-05 | |
| oaire.citation.conferencePlace | Iguazu Falls, Brazil | |
| oaire.citation.title | 22nd Congress of the International Society of Human and Medical Mycology (ISHAM), 20-24 may 2025 | |
| oaire.version | http://purl.org/coar/version/c_970fb48d4fbd8a85 |