[Info-vax] COVID-19

[Stephen Hoffman]

On 2020-12-13 20:44:55 +0000, Jan-Erik Søderholm said:

> But the "infected" numbers are very hard to value since they are very 
> much depending on the volume of testing done.

More tests does not mean more cases.

With sufficient tests to gain a reasonable sample of the population, 
it's the positivity rate of the tests run that matters, and less the 
total number of tests run.

Fewer tests with a higher positivity rate means that the current 
testing regime is missing more cases.

Lower positivity rates—and again, with some diversity of the test 
sampling—means fewer cases, even with fewer tests.

If running very few tests and/or targeting those tests to suspected 
cases or specific populations—again, with little diversity of 
sampling—then that's not getting good general data.

https://www.jhsph.edu/covid-19/articles/covid-19-testing-understanding-the-percent-positive.html 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2020/06/22/no-more-testing-doesnt-explain-rise-covid-19-cases-us/ 



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