Cape Town – A study has found that less than 4% of the coronavirus research is relevant to Africa – despite 17% of the world's population live in Africa.
The study was published in the online journal BMJ global health on Tuesday.
With nearly 4 million confirmed cases across the continent, the authors of the study said the relative lack of research on Africa, or authored by Africans, added to the growing body of "evidence of coloniality in global health research and decision-making".
One of the authors of the study, Musa Abubakar Kana, says it is important for Africans to publish research on Covid-19 in Africa because this helps to create locally relevant knowledge to address the pandemic.
"The time has come that authoritative journals need to turn to authors and ask where local representation is on papers describing health systems in regions that are not their own – else the inequity and coloniality highlighted in this review are perpetuated," he said.
The study included a total of 2 196 articles on Covid-19, with 9 222 authors listed across them and, in all, just 94 articles (4.3%) contained content related to Africa or a specific African country; 292 (3.2%) of the authors were affiliated to an African organisation.
Almost two-thirds (65%) of articles by Africans on Covid-19 were from just three countries: South Africa, Egypt and Nigeria.
Thabo Mabuka, the co-founder of the Afrikan Research Initiative (ARI), a platform which provides vital epidemiological information about Covid-19 in Africa, says there is a growing need for Afrocentric information and data.
“We also wanted to meet the growing need for Afrocentric information and data on pertinent issues that affect our country and the continent.The coronavirus disease is one such example. We want to show that we are proactive in the research space,” he said.
Dr Borna Nyaoke-Anoke, Senior Clinical Project Manager for the largest Covid-19 clinical trial in mild-to-moderate outpatients in Africa, said: “We need research here in Africa that will inform policies and test-and-treat strategies, so that as clinicians we can give the best options to people with Covid19.”
Meanwhile, Dr John Nkengasong, Director of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, said: "There is a need for large clinical trials in Africa for Covid-19 to answer research questions that are specific to an African context.”