What is it about?
We mapped COVID-19 data publicly available in nine countries (Bangladesh, Indonesia, Iran, Nigeria, Turkey, Panama, Greece, the UK, and the Netherlands) and we measured data availability and transparency and we estimated data accessibility and credibility. All countries reported periodically most of COVID-19 metrics on the total population. Data were more frequently broken down by age, sex, and region than by ethnic group or socio-economic status. Data on COVID-19 is partially available for special groups such as health workers, inmates, refugees, students, and residents in nursing homes.
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Why is it important?
We report evidence on how the more data is publicly available the more transparency, accountability, and democratisation of the research process is enabled, allowing a sound evidence-based analysis of the consequences of health policies. For example data broken down by ethnic group as reported by the Office for National Statistics in the UK, prompted a parliamentary investigation on why COVID-19 mortality rates were highest among people from Black, Asian, and Minority Ethnic (BAME) groups, with Black males 3.3 times more likely to die compared to their white counterparts. That investigation resulted in a report suggesting that racism, discrimination, and social inequalities have contributed to the increased risks not only of infection but also of complications and death from COVID-19 among minority ethnic people.
Perspectives
A pandemic at the time of the globalisation is characterised also by data sharing and crowdsourcing of data analysis and solutions. This has been pivotal at the beginning of 2020, where all scientists came together to learn from data. Relevant data collection can be relatively easily achieved in many countries, for the clinical management of the pandemic. When this is accompanied by maximising data availability, accessibility, transparency and credibility to the scientific community and general public, both scientific understanding and political accountability were improved.
Valentina Gallo
Rijksuniversiteit Groningen
For any research, data is the source of identifying any issues according to our objective. While it has been observed that, due to the lack of proper documentation of the data in many countries worldwide, researchers fail to identify the main problem. In the health sector, data is profoundly important as it deals with human health and well-being. However, it has been observed that countries with more publicly available data are more transparency, accountability, and democratization of the research process. And this paper might give anyone a short piece of evidence on this.
Arifa Tabassum
Jahangirnagar University
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Mind the gap: Data availability, accessibility, transparency, and credibility during the COVID-19 pandemic, an international comparative appraisal, PLOS Global Public Health, April 2023, PLOS,
DOI: 10.1371/journal.pgph.0001148.
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