Dear HIFA colleagues,
The message below was circulated this morning on CHIFA, our sister forum on global child health and rights www.chifa.org
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I wanted to draw a recent article in the BMJ to the attention of the group. It is entitled 'Anger, despair, and defiance from a voice within the US federal research system' For those with internet access, it can be accessed at https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.r294
The anonymous author describes the chilling effect of edicts from the US government draconian measures to close down funding for health research and to suppress scientific freedom to use terms that the Trump regime objects to. Below is the opening paragraph:
'People around the world are watching with disbelief as the new US government closes down its aid programme, withdraws from the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Paris agreement on climate change, deletes datasets that do not fit with its ideology, refuses to pay adequate overhead to universities — so halting research and bankrupting many, and insists that certain words are not used in federal documents, including federally funded research. The words that must not be used include bias, biased, women or female, and it’s impossible to see how scientifically valid research can be conducted without these words: we won’t, for example, be able to write about risk of bias in a sample of women, who make up half the population.'
Banning certain words is truly frightening as is the effect of closure of the USAID programme on many of the world's poorest children and their families. Members of the International Society for Social Pediatrics and Child Health (ISSOP) are coming together to resist these policies and advocate (another banned word) for those whose health, wellbeing and scientific freedom is under threat. We welcome participation in this action by CHIFA colleagues. One aspect of our action will be to compile anecdotes/stories of the effect of Washington's decisions on the health and wellbeing of children across the world. Contributions from CHIFA colleagues working on the frontline in affected countries would be most welcome.
Nick Spencer on behalf of ISSOP
Professor Nick Spencer, Emeritus Professor of Child Health ISSOP Past President
CHIFA profile: Nick Spencer is Emeritus Professor of Child Health at the School of Health and Social Studies, University of Warwick in the UK. N.J.Spencer AT warwick.ac.uk
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Best wishes, Neil
HIFA profile: Neil Pakenham-Walsh is coordinator of HIFA (Healthcare Information For All), a global health community that brings all stakeholders together around the shared goal of universal access to reliable healthcare information. HIFA has 20,000 members in 180 countries, interacting in four languages and representing all parts of the global evidence ecosystem. HIFA is administered by Global Healthcare Information Network, a UK-based nonprofit in official relations with the World Health Organization. Email: neil@hifa.org