Preparing ethical review systems for emergencies: next steps.

Ethical review systems need to build on their experiences of COVID-19 research to enhance their preparedness for future pandemics. Recommendations from representatives from over twenty countries include: improving relationships across the research ecosystem; demonstrating willingness to reform and adapt systems and processes; and making the case robustly for better resourcing.

Ethics, climate change and health - a landscape review.

Anthropogenic climate change is unequivocal, and many of its physical health impacts have been identified, although further research is required into the mental health and wellbeing effects of climate change. There is a lack of understanding of the importance of ethics in policy-responses to health and climate change which is also linked to the lack of specific action-guiding ethical resources for researchers and practitioners. There is a marked paucity of ethically-informed health input into economic policy-responses to climate change-an area of important future work.

Ethical research when abortion access is legally restricted.

Risks and benefits of some clinical research may be altered.

Ethical implications of economic compensation for voluntary medical male circumcision for HIV prevention and epidemic control.

Despite tremendous efforts in fighting HIV over the last decades, the estimated annual number of new infections is still a staggering 1.5 million. There is evidence that voluntary medical male circumcision (VMMC) provides protection against men's heterosexual acquisition of HIV-1 infection.

Data sharing governance in sub-Saharan Africa during public health emergencies: Gaps and guidance.

While the COVID-19 pandemic has captured the attention of the global community since the end of 2019, deadly health pandemics are not new to Africa. Tuberculosis (TB), malaria and human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) count amongst other serious diseases that have had a catastrophic impact on the African continent. Effective responses to such pandemics require high-quality, comprehensive data sets that can inform policymaking and enhance healthcare decision-making.

WHO guidance on COVID-19 vaccine trial designs in the context of authorized COVID-19 vaccines and expanding global access: Ethical considerations.

While the degree of COVID-19 vaccine accessibility and uptake varies at both national and global levels, increasing vaccination coverage raises questions regarding the standard of prevention that ought to apply to different settings where COVID-19 vaccine trials are hosted. A WHO Expert Group has developed guidance on the ethical implications of conducting placebo-controlled trials in the context of expanding global COVID-19 vaccine coverage. The guidance also considers alternative trial designs to placebo controlled trials in the context of prototype vaccines, modified vaccines, and next generation vaccines.

Ending the evidence gap for pregnancy, HIV and co-infections: ethics guidance from the PHASES project.

Introduction: While pregnant people have been an important focus for HIV research, critical evidence gaps remain regarding prevention, co-infection, and safety and efficacy of new antiretroviral therapies in pregnancy. Such gaps can result in harm: without safety data, drugs used may carry unacceptable risks to the foetus or pregnant person; without pregnancy-specific dosing data, pregnant people face risks of both toxicity and undertreatment; and delays in gathering evidence can limit access to beneficial next-generation drugs. Despite recognition of the need, numerous barriers and ethical complexities have limited progress.

Governing the Access to COVID-19 Tools Accelerator: towards greater participation, transparency, and accountability.

The Access to COVID-19 Tools Accelerator (ACT-A) is a multistakeholder initiative quickly constructed in the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic to respond to a catastrophic breakdown in global cooperation. ACT-A is now the largest international effort to achieve equitable access to COVID-19 health technologies, and its governance is a matter of broad public importance. We traced the evolution of ACT-A's governance through publicly available documents and analysed it against three principles embedded in the founding mission statement of ACT-A: participation, transparency, and accountability.

Preprints in times of COVID19: the time is ripe for agreeing on terminology and good practices.

Over recent years, the research community has been increasingly using preprint servers to share manuscripts that are not yet peer-reviewed. Even if it enables quick dissemination of research findings, this practice raises several challenges in publication ethics and integrity. In particular, preprints have become an important source of information for stakeholders interested in COVID19 research developments, including traditional media, social media, and policy makers.

SARS-CoV-2 Variants and Vaccines.

Viral variants of concern may emerge with dangerous resistance to the immunity generated by the current vaccines to prevent coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19). Moreover, if some variants of concern have increased transmissibility or virulence, the importance of efficient public health measures and vaccination programs will increase. The global response must be both timely and science based.

High incidence and persistence of hepatitis B virus infection in individuals receiving HIV care in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa.

Background: Hepatitis B virus (HBV), Human Immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and Tuberculosis (TB) are common infections in South Africa. We utilized the opportunity of care provision for HIV-TB co-infected patients to better understand the relationship between these coinfections, determine the magnitude of the problem, and identify risk factors for HBV infection in HIV infected patients with and without TB in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa.

Methods: This retrospective cohort analysis was undertaken in 2018.

The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic response on other health research.

While governments have been focusing on the unprecedented disruption to the global economy caused by coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) and the urgent need for COVID-19 research, other health research has become a casualty of the pandemic. Major research operations that are unrelated to COVID-19 have been significantly diminished or suspended entirely because of either COVID-19-related legal restrictions or logistical, staffing or operational concerns. Billions of people globally are currently affected by lockdowns or curfews.

Artificial Intelligence and global health: opportunities and challenges.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) offers unprecedented opportunities and challenges for humanity. If AI can be positioned and leveraged correctly, it can rapidly accelerate progress on achieving the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), including SDG #3: 'Ensure healthy lives and promote wellbeing for all at all ages'. Achieving this goal could have a transformative impact on global health.

COVID-19 therapeutics: how to sow confusion and break public trust during international public health emergencies.

Since SARS-CoV2 was declared a , those tasked with the stewardship of public health at a global, regional, and local level-policymakers, politicians, scientists, drug regulators, health officials, professional associations, journal editors, publishers, and clinicians-have displayed rushed decisions and lapses in judgment in their handling of chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine as potential COVID-19 therapeutics and prophylactics. These lapses merit noting as they hold lessons for how the guardians of medicines regulation and public health can inadvertently sow confusion and damage public trust.

The Case for Why Africa Should Host COVID-19 Candidate Vaccine Trials.

In response to provocative comments by 2 European clinicians and scientists, the World Health Organization Director General has declared that Africa will not host COVID-19 vaccine trials. Such a stance risks stigmatizing COVID-19 vaccine trials in Africa and depriving Africa of critical research. To the contrary, there is a critical need for Africa to host COVID-19 vaccine trials on public health, scientific, and ethics grounds.