ANALYSIS OF TUBERCULOSIS AND HIV CASES IN WEST AFRICA USING PANEL POISSON AND NEGATIVE BINOMIAL REGRESSION MODELS

Tuberculosis is a leading cause of death worldwide and the leading cause from a single infectious agent, ranking above Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS). The aim of this study is to ascertain the trend of tuberculosis prevalence and the effect of HIV prevalence on Tuberculosis in some West African countries from 2000 to 2016 using count panel data regression models. The data used annual HIV and Tuberculosis cases spanning from 2000 to 2016 extracted from online publication of World health Organization (WHO). Panel Poisson regression model and Negative binomial regression model for fixed and random effects were used to analyze the count data, the result revealed a positive trend in TB cases as even increase in HIV cases also lead to increase in TB in West African countries. Among the competing models used in this study, Panel Negative Binomial Regression Model with fixed effect emerged the best model with log likelihood value of -1336.554. This study recommend that Government and NGOs need more strategies to fight against HIV menace in West Africa as this will in turn reduce TB cases in West Africa.