Related papers: More testing or more disease? A counterfactual app…

HIV pre-exposure Prophylaxis (PrEP) has become essential for global HIV control, but its implementation coincides with rising bacterial STI rates among men who have sex with men (MSM). While risk-compensation behavioral changes like reduced…

In the pool of people seeking partners, a uniformly greater preference for abstinence increases the prevalence of infection and worsens everyone's welfare. In contrast, prevention and treatment reduce prevalence and improve payoffs. The…

I study the economic effects of testing during the outbreak of a novel disease. I propose a model where testing permits isolation of the infected and provides agents with information about the prevalence and lethality of the disease.…

False positive results in screening tests have potentially severe psychological, medical, and financial consequences for the recipient. However, there have been few efforts to quantify how the risk of a false positive accumulates over time.…

Testing symptomatic individuals for a disease can deliver treatment resources, if tests' results turn positive, which speeds up their treatment and might also decrease individuals' contacts to other ones. An imperfect test, however, might…

The OraQuick In-Home HIV self-test represents a fast, inexpensive, and convenient method for users to assess their HIV status. If integrated thoughtfully into existing testing practices, accompanied by efficient pathways to formal…

The topic of this paper is prevalence estimation from the perspective of active information. Prevalence among tested individuals has an upward bias under the assumption that individuals' willingness to be tested for the disease increases…

During the COVID-19 pandemic, many institutions such as universities and workplaces implemented testing regimens with every member of some population tested longitudinally, and those testing positive isolated for some time. Although the…

In epidemic or pandemic situations, resources for testing the infection status of individuals may be scarce. Although group testing can help to significantly increase testing capabilities, the (repeated) testing of entire populations can…

The COVID-19 pandemic has plagued the world for months. The U.S. has taken measures to counter it. On a daily basis, newly confirmed cases have been reported. In the early days, these numbers showed an increasing trend. Recently, the…

The spread of sexually transmitted diseases (e.g. Chlamydia, Syphilis, Gonorrhea, HIV) across populations is a major concern for scientists and health agencies. In this context, both data collection on sexual contact networks and the…

We consider real-time timely tracking of infection status (e.g., covid-19) of individuals in a population. In this work, a health care provider wants to detect infected people as well as people who have recovered from the disease as quickly…

The positivity assumption is central in the identification of a causal effect, and especially the stochastic variant is an issue many applied researchers face, yet is rarely discussed, especially in conjunction with continuous treatments or…

Sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) are a group of pathogens infecting new hosts through sexual interactions. Due to its social and economic burden, multiple models have been proposed to study the spreading of pathogens. In parallel, in…

Standard measures of effect, including the risk ratio, the odds ratio, and the risk difference, are associated with a number of well-described shortcomings, and no consensus exists about the conditions under which investigators should…

The government's effort to alleviate HIV stigma has been justified by the suppression effect of stigma on the HIV testing rate. Nevertheless, the deterrence effect of stigma on undesirable sexual behaviours has long been overlooked. This…

We consider real-time timely tracking of infection status (e.g., covid-19) of individuals in a population. In this work, a health care provider wants to detect infected people as well as people who recovered from the disease as quickly as…

As a consequence of missing data on tests for infection and imperfect accuracy of tests, reported rates of population infection by the SARS CoV-2 virus are lower than actual rates of infection. Hence, reported rates of severe illness…

Urban areas with larger and more connected populations offer an auspicious environment for contagion processes such as the spread of pathogens. Empirical evidence reveals a systematic increase in the rates of certain sexually transmitted…

Chlamydia trachomatis is the most commonly reported infectious disease in the United States and causes important reproductive morbidity in women. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have recommended routine screening of sexually…