3 ms·
I don't see how we can meaningfully estimate the reproductive rate with such variable testing rates and patterns. Some places barely test people with severe sym
by standardUser 7y ago
I don't see how we can meaningfully estimate the reproductive rate with such variable testing rates and patterns. Some places barely test people with severe symptoms, other places are testing anyone they can that may have been exposed. Some states have tested less than 0.5% of the population, others have tested 3% plus. Testing criteria and rates and test availability are all changing from place-to-place in ways that I have not seen sufficiently tracked. So we can't even correct for those variations if we tried.
- cperciva 7y agoTesting rates and patterns don't make as much difference as you might think. They'll dramatically affect the absolute numbers, but to a first approximation the curves will have the same shape and thus estimates of R won't be thrown off. The bigger problem is that R varies across the population; if you're testing primarily old age care homes you'll end up estimating what R is in that community rather than estimating R in the broader (mostly untested) community.
- rwcarlsen 7y agoThe curves won't have the same shape if test availability and circumstances under which people are tested change. And I think those things are definitely changing over time.
- cperciva 7y agoSure, if testing changes, it throws things off. (Unless you can figure out how to adjust for the changes in testing rate and methodology.) I was talking about the issue of different jurisdictions testing differently.
- mzs 7y agoThis is precisely where Bayesian stats shine: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0002185 https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal...