Statistical Design and Analysis of Diagnostic Tests for Mutating Viruses

As the SARS-CoV-2 virus mutates, mutations harboured in patients become increasingly diverse. Patients classified into two strains may have overlapping non-variant-defining mutations.

Mutation calling by sequencing is relative to a reference genome . As SARS-CoV-2 mutates, tracking emerging mutant strains may become increasingly problematic if the reference genome remains Wuhan-Hu-1, because the comparison then becomes indirect : current dominant strain relative to Wuhan-Hu-1 versus emerging strain relative to Wuhan-Hu-1.

The original Thermo Fisher’s TaqPath PCR test, on which the UK has standardized national testing of SARS-CoV-2 primarily, targets Wuhan-Hu-1. PCR targets appear readily updated, as TaqPath 2.0 now targets both currently known and future SARS-CoV-2 mutations, probing the N gene and ORF1ab but not the S gene, with 8 probes instead of the original 3 probes. Going forward, our statistical method can more directly compare current wildtype versus emerging mutants, since our new method can use any pair of probes updated to probe the current wildtype and anticipated mutations.

The fact that patients harbour mixtures of mutations allows our statistical methods to potentially catch emerging mutants. Given a PCR test which targets the current dominant strain (current wildtype), our statistical method can potentially directly differentiate the current wildtype from an emerging strain.