Research and ethics in China

Abstract

China has the largest scientific workforce in the world and an impressively increasing publication rate, but her research has been dogged by concerns about ethics. This worry has led to several cautionary statements for researchers. The latest, the China–UK Research Ethics (CURE) committee report is published today by the UK Medical Research Council (MRC). The report identifies centres of excellence and describes evolving research cultures for stem-cell study, clinical trials in infectious diseases, and traditional Chinese medicine. However, there are also examples of inconsistent ethics and lax governance that should not be ignored.The findings are broadly similar to the 2002 Nuffield Council on Bioethics report, The ethics of research related to healthcare in developing countries. This recommended that the beneficiaries of research should be clearly identified, research participants protected from exploitation, cultural values acknowledged, ethical standards scrutinised, and local governance strengthened as part of building research capacity. Among the MRC's many excellent recommendations is that sponsors satisfy themselves that proposed research meets ethical and regulatory standards in the UK and China. Beyond the MRC findings, visiting scientists have a responsibility to inculcate sound ethics by demonstrating probity in their own work.There are other reasons why China is not yet realising her full potential as a research leader. One factor may be bureaucracy. China hosts only 3% of the world's sites for pharmaceutical-industry-sponsored trials, although this proportion is growing steadily. The figure is probably low because of the slow approval process for new trials. Clearly, China's ambition—and potential—to become a scientific superpower cannot be realised fully until a robust infrastructure of ethical review, strong governance, and streamlined administration is in place and applied rigorously. Only China can decide if and when these changes are made.In the meantime, the CURE report reminds all sponsors and researchers of their duty of care to trial participants in any country. China has the largest scientific workforce in the world and an impressively increasing publication rate, but her research has been dogged by concerns about ethics. This worry has led to several cautionary statements for researchers. The latest, the China–UK Research Ethics (CURE) committee report is published today by the UK Medical Research Council (MRC). The report identifies centres of excellence and describes evolving research cultures for stem-cell study, clinical trials in infectious diseases, and traditional Chinese medicine. However, there are also examples of inconsistent ethics and lax governance that should not be ignored. The findings are broadly similar to the 2002 Nuffield Council on Bioethics report, The ethics of research related to healthcare in developing countries. This recommended that the beneficiaries of research should be clearly identified, research participants protected from exploitation, cultural values acknowledged, ethical standards scrutinised, and local governance strengthened as part of building research capacity. Among the MRC's many excellent recommendations is that sponsors satisfy themselves that proposed research meets ethical and regulatory standards in the UK and China. Beyond the MRC findings, visiting scientists have a responsibility to inculcate sound ethics by demonstrating probity in their own work. There are other reasons why China is not yet realising her full potential as a research leader. One factor may be bureaucracy. China hosts only 3% of the world's sites for pharmaceutical-industry-sponsored trials, although this proportion is growing steadily. The figure is probably low because of the slow approval process for new trials. Clearly, China's ambition—and potential—to become a scientific superpower cannot be realised fully until a robust infrastructure of ethical review, strong governance, and streamlined administration is in place and applied rigorously. Only China can decide if and when these changes are made. In the meantime, the CURE report reminds all sponsors and researchers of their duty of care to trial participants in any country.