Application of the ARIMA Model in Forecasting the Incidence of Tuberculosis in Anhui During COVID-19 Pandemic from 2021 to 2022

OBJECTIVE: Forecasting the seasonality and trend of pulmonary tuberculosis is important for the rational allocation of health resources. In this study, we predict the incidence of pulmonary tuberculosis by establishing the autoregressive integrated moving average (ARIMA) model and providing support for pulmonary tuberculosis prevention and control during COVID-19 pandemic. METHODS: Registered tuberculosis(TB) cases from January 2013 to December 2020 in Anhui province were analysed using traditional descriptive epidemiological methods. Then we used the monthly incidence rate of TB from January 2013 through June 2020 to construct ARIMA model, and used the incidence rate from July 2020 to December 2020 to evaluate the forecasting accuracy. Ljung Box test, Akaike's information criterion(AICc), Bayesian information criterion(BIC) and Realtive error were used to evaluate the model fitting and forecasting effect, Finally, the optimal model was used to forecast the expected monthly incidence of tuberculosis for 2021 and 2022 to learn about the incidence trend. RESULTS: A total of 255,656 TB cases were registered. The reported rate of tuberculosis was highest in 2013 and lowest in 2020. The peak incidence was in March, Tongling (71.97/100,000), Chizhou (59.93/100,000), and Huainan (58.36/100,000) had the highest number of cases. The ratio of male to female incidence was 2.59:1, with the largest proportion of people being between 66 and 75 years old. The main occupation of patients was farmer. ARIMA (0, 1, 1) (0, 1, 1)(12) model was the optimal model to forecast the incidence trend of TB. CONCLUSION: Tongling, Chizhou, and Huainan should strengthen measures for TB. In particular, the government should pay more attention on elderly people to prevent tuberculosis infections. The rate of TB patient registration and reporting has decreased under the pandemic of COVID-19. The ARIMA model can be a useful tool for predicting future TB cases.