AIDS projection using non-parametric backcalculation method.

Venkatesan, P.; Porchelvan, S.

Book published by Allied Publishers P Ltd. on Mathematics, Computing and Modeling. Ed. P. Balasubramaniam and R. Uthayakumar. 2007; 283-288.

Abstract: The method of backcalculation has been used to estimate the unobserved past incidence of infection with HIV and to obtain projections of the future AIDS incidence. The backcalculation incorporates only elementary assumptions about the way the data are generated and requires only limited additional information. The nonparametric approach to backcalculation which avoids parametric assumptions about the form of HIV infection intensity is considered in this work. The new approach allows the data to determine the estimated intensity function and is based on an EM algorithm for maximizing likelihood estimation that incorporates smoothing of the estimated parameters. This method is illustrated with applications to Indian AIDS incidence data. The nonparametric approach to back calculation is a recent development in methodology and the projections based on nonparametric approach to Indian data is a new attempt. The nonparametric based estimates compares well with the parametric based approaches with minimum assumptions.

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