Comparing Data Collection Strategies via Input Uncertainty When Simulating Testing Policies Using Viral Load Profiles

Abstract

Temporal profiles of viral load have individual variability and are used to determine whether individuals are infected based on some limit of detection. Modelling and simulating viral load profiles allows for the performance of testing policies to be estimated, however viral load behaviour can be very uncertain. We describe an approach for studying the input uncertainty passed to simulated policy performance when viral load profiles are estimated from different data collection strategies. Our example shows that comparing the strategies solely based on input uncertainty is inappropriate due to the differences in confidence interval coverage caused by negatively biased simulation outputs.