Forecasting COVID-19 cases based on a parameter-varying stochastic SIR model

We address the prediction of the number of new cases and deaths for the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) over a future horizon from historical data (forecasting). We use a model-based approach based on a stochastic Susceptible-Infections-Removed (SIR) model with time-varying parameters, which captures the evolution of the disease dynamics in response to changes in social behavior, non-pharmaceutical interventions, and testing rates. We show that, in the presence of asymptomatic cases, such model includes internal parameters and states that cannot be uniquely identified solely on the basis of measurements of new cases and deaths, but this does not preclude the construction of reliable forecasts for future values of these measurements. Such forecasts and associated confidence intervals can be computed using an iterative algorithm based on nonlinear optimization solvers, without the need for Monte Carlo sampling. Our results have been validated on an extensive COVID-19 dataset covering the period from March through December 2020 on 144 regions around the globe.