Ethics in collaborative global health networks

Collaborative global health research involves the establishment of large and diverse multinational scientific networks. These require the development and maintenance of sustainable partnerships involving a range of diverse yet interdependent forms of expertise such as: epidemiologists, geneticists, statisticians, specialists in information technology, database managers, health professionals, fieldworkers, cutting-edge genotyping facilities, multiple funding agencies, and communities. Such networks also bring together diverse institutions in developed and developing countries which may in other respects be in competition for both scientific prestige and resources. The dependence of successful science upon the sustainability of such networks means that one of the key potential roadblocks to such research is the building and maintenance of (a) the relationships, shared values and practices underpinning collaborative science, and (b) the mechanisms for working in the context of different ethical values and commitments. This suggests too the importance of building and maintaining both 'trust' and 'confidence'.

A key roadblock in the future development of collaborative global health research is the need to reach agreement about the development of appropriate mechanisms for the oversight of data release and data sharing. This is an especially pressing issue in the context of the pressures for open access, and in relation to the responsibility for such networks to protect the emerging scientific capacity in developing countries, and in particular that of their partners. If the data produced by the network on the basis of samples and phenotype descriptions collected by partners in developing countries is rapidly utilised by institutions in the North at the expense of emergent capacity in the Southern institutions which contributed to the generation of the data, this has the potential to undermine long-term trust. It may also undermine the emergence of the type of networked science that is currently seen to be essential to understanding disease and addressing the healthcare needs of the poorest people.

Michael Parker is carrying out empirical ethics research, using MalariaGEN as a case study, to map the ways in which global collaborative networks of medical researchers, clinicians, communities and individuals identify, negotiate and address potential 'roadblocks' in the process of developing and maintaining the relationships, shared values and practices underpinning collaborative science and a successful international research network.