"We can certainly see this week that the situation has stabilized. Although there is a high level of the virus, there is no more of it," said lead researcher and University of Tartu antimicrobial technology professor. The highest rates of coronavirus in sewage were discovered in southern and southeastern Estonia.

Tenson added that stabilization is also confirmed by experience from previous coronavirus waves: if the number of infections goes down, there is less of the coronavirus in wastewater. "This confirms that the situation will not get worse right away," the researcher said.

Since the number of daily infections is still in the hundreds, it is difficult to predict the virus pulling back quickly. Infection indicators over the last few days help researchers model future scenarios, Tenson said.

"If we extrapolate the curve from the last few days, we can see that the situation could be considerably better in about a month. At the same time, there are no parameters, which say we will not have any infections in a week," he said, repeating that Estonia could reach a relatively normal situation in about a month.

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