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The Fragility of Scientific Rigour and Integrity in “Sped up Science”: Research Misconduct, Bias, and Hype and in the COVID-19 Pandemic

  • Symposium: Viral Trajectories
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Abstract

During the early years of the COVID-19 pandemic, preclinical and clinical research were sped up and scaled up in both the public and private sectors and in partnerships between them. This resulted in some extraordinary advances, but it also raised a range of issues regarding the ethics, rigour, and integrity of scientific research, academic publication, and public communication. Many of the failures of scientific rigour and integrity that occurred during the pandemic were exacerbated by the rush to generate, disseminate, and implement research findings, which not only created opportunities for unscrupulous actors but also compromised the methodological, peer review, and advisory processes that would usually identify sub-standard research and prevent compromised clinical or policy-level decisions. While it would be tempting to attribute these failures of science and its translation solely to the “unprecedented” circumstances of the COVID-19 pandemic, the reality is that they preceded the pandemic and will continue to arise once it is over. Existing strategies for promoting scientific rigour and integrity need to be made more rigorous, better integrated into research training and institutional cultures, and made more sophisticated. They might also need to be modified or supplemented with other strategies that are fit for purpose not only in public health emergencies but in any research that is sped-up and scaled up to address urgent unmet medical needs.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Philosophy, Macquarie University, Sydney, NSW, Australia

    W. Lipworth & I. Kerridge

  2. Royal North Shore Hospital and Sydney Health Ethics, University of Sydney, Sydney, NSW, Australia

    I. Kerridge

  3. Sydney Law School, University of Sydney, Sydney, NSW, Australia

    C. Stewart

  4. Sydney Health Ethics, Faculty of Medicine and Health, University of Sydney, Sydney, NSW, Australia

    D. Silva

  5. Dalla Lana School of Public Health, University of Toronto, Toronto, Canada

    R. Upshur

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Lipworth, W., Kerridge, I., Stewart, C. et al. The Fragility of Scientific Rigour and Integrity in “Sped up Science”: Research Misconduct, Bias, and Hype and in the COVID-19 Pandemic. Bioethical Inquiry 20, 607–616 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11673-023-10289-w

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