Comparison of growth, time series, and hybrid models for HIV infectious disease incidence in adults in Saudi Arabia.

Authors

Muhammad Daniyal, Nadia Shabnam, Hanan Alyami, Ali Jaber Alqahtani, Madiha Shakeel, Mohammed Sharaf Alabdullah, Batool Mohammed Alhassan, Abbas Al Mutair, Hibah Abdulrahim Bahri

Published in

BMC infectious diseases. Jul 18, 2026. Epub Jul 18, 2026.

Abstract

HIV (Human Immunodeficiency Virus) is a virus that causes the immune system to be damaged, which results in reducing the body's ability to defend against infections and illnesses. This study aims to model new HIV cases among adults in KSA using selected growth, time series, and hybrid models.
The study utilized official data on new HIV/AIDS cases among adults (15-49) from the World Bank website for the period 1990-2024. Various growth, conventional time series and hybrid models were proposed and used to model the series. The accuracy measures like RMSE, MAE, MAPE, MASE, and SMAPE were used to compare models, and the DM test was applied to assess the consistency between model predictions. Results were considered statistically significant if p < 0.05 and all the analyses and visualizations were performed in R-Studio.
The time-series data of newly infected HIV cases among adults (ages 15-49) from 1990 to 2024 showed the mean number of cases was approximately 502 ± 323. Among the hybrid frameworks evaluated, Exponential-ETS emerged as the superior model, attaining the lowest RMSE value of 91.500, outperforming all competing specifications. The forecast for 2025 using the hybrid model projects new cases at 1,553.91 (95% CI: 1,272.23-1,828.94), rising to 2,157.74 (95% CI: 1,497.40-2,866.45) by 2029. However, the projected annual increment is lower than the surge observed in 2019-2024.
This study concluded that the hybrid model provides the most robust forecasting framework for HIV incidence in KSA. The 5-year projections indicated a continued upward trend, but with a decelerated rate of growth compared to the sharp surge observed in 2019-2024. This deceleration suggests progress towards Vision 2030 goals of reducing the burden of infectious diseases through strengthened health infrastructure, expanded screening programs, and improved public health awareness.

PMID:
42471559
Bibliographic data and abstract were imported from PubMed on 19 Jul 2026.

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