(REFERENCE: PHA4GE/2021-02)

Public Health Alliance for Genomic Epidemiology (PHA4GE) (www.pha4ge.org) is a global consortium established in 2019, to ensure a rapid global genomic-driven public health response to disease outbreaks. Our community includes partners and stakeholders such as funders, public health organizations at international, regional and national levels; and non-specialist individuals across the world. The consortium has Working Groups, that are made up of representative individuals, from the growing list of over 30 partner organizations.  These Working Groups drive various activities to fulfil the consortium’s mission. Our mission is to establish global consensus on data standards, document and share best practices, improve the availability of critical bioinformatic tools and resources and advocate for greater openness, interoperability, accessibility and reproducibility in public health bioinformatics. 

Application for small grants: Ethics and Data Sharing Projects

1. Information about the grant

1.1 Background to the PHA4GE Ethics and Data Sharing Working Group

The PHA4GE Ethics and Data-Sharing Working Group aims to establish, facilitate and support an inclusive, diverse, equitable and collaborative ethics community that can promote ethics research, develop ethics training and increase capacity for informed, practical and agile solutions to high priority ethics and data sharing issues.  

The PHA4GE Ethics Working Group hosts an online Ethics and Data Sharing Platform to encourage conversations and collaborations between ethicists and other researchers with an interest in research ethics, data governance and related topics. The platform provides a forum for discussion; Q&A for sharing questions, solutions and guidance; collaborations and other activities, all aimed at gaining insights and solutions into ethical issues in research. Through this forum the ethics and genomic epidemiology community will support new research, address current issues, and train the next generation of ethicists and researchers by actively supporting and including young researchers in platform activities. The PHA4GE Ethics Platform is intended to be a safe, respectful, collegial, inclusive and equitable space that advances ethics research and nurtures researchers from a wide variety of different professional backgrounds and career stages. In the first round of PHA4GE funding (PHA4GE 1.0, 2021) four Ethics and Data Sharing projects were funded through the subaward process and these are ongoing. 

The PHA4GE Ethics and Data Sharing Working Group Terms of Reference can be found here.

1.2 The funding

This funding is available for small grants to complete projects for which progress will be communicated and followed on the PHA4GE Ethics and Data Sharing Platform (https://ethics-datasharing.pha4ge.org/).  All proposed projects must respect current COVID-19 safety protocols, and researchers representing each funded project must be willing to attend an in-person workshop as permitted by current COVID-19 protocols. The workshop travel, accommodation and catering costs for several researchers from each of the successful applications will be covered by PHA4GE. For the in-person workshop, proof of COVID-19 vaccination will be required for all attendees.  Successful applicants attending the workshop must provide their own health insurance for travel to the workshop. 

The total amount available for this programme is USD 25 000. The maximum amount that may be requested for a project is USD 5000. 

The PHA4GE and the Ethics and Data Sharing WG reserve the right to not disburse the full amount, and close the call once funding has been disbursed to successful applications. 

1.3 Types of projects to be funded

If successful in the application for funding, the project’s planning and progress MUST be communicated on the PHA4GE Ethics and Data Sharing Platform, encouraging a collaborative process with open ongoing discussions and communications.

Examples of successful types of projects might include, but are not limited to: 

• Writing systematic reviews or scoping papers
• Building frameworks or guidelines for ethical and data sharing challenges
• Running an online workshop which develops guidelines, publications, tools
• Running a survey and analyzing the results
• Building tools that support ethics and data sharing
• Designing and implementing a training workshop or training materials (could be online or in person)
• Developing a curriculum for ethics/data sharing training

1.4 Disbursement of funds for successful applications

The funding will be disbursed after attendance at the workshop and finalizing the project plan, as approved by the PHA4GE Ethics and Data Sharing Working Group. Where appropriate, funding payments may occur in stages based on completion of key milestones for the funded project.

All projects funded must provide for assessment a submission-ready manuscript to the PHA4GE Ethics and Data Sharing WG with supporting materials where appropriate by 1 August 2023. 

A short (~500 words) monthly update on progress must be provided on the platform project thread by the end of each calendar month. 

1.5 Expected outcomes

The funded project must result in a peer-reviewed publication of sufficient quality to be published in a reputable Open Access peer-reviewed journal indexed in PubMed. 

Any tools or research outputs generated as part of the project must be made openly available in a suitable online repository and via the PHA4GE Ethics and Data Sharing platform (e.g. GitHub, Figshare). 

At the end of the funding period, a short final written report will be required from awardees, which will describe challenges and successes of the project and the experience of using the PHA4GE Ethics and Data Sharing platform to conduct the project. A template will be provided for this report when it is required.

2. Application process

2.1 Complete the Application Proposal Outline

The applicants must complete the application form, found at the end of this document. 

The form includes information about the proposed research and a plan for publishing the project outcomes.

2.2 Review Process

Applications must be submitted by the deadline of 24:00hr (SAST) on 3 July 2022, by saving the application form as a pdf document and emailing the completed, signed application form to [email protected]

Timelines

• Applicants will be informed of the outcome of their application by 25 July 2022. 
• An online orientation session will be held for successful applicants in the week of 5-11 September 2022.
• Anticipated formal start date for projects will be 12 September 2022.
• End date for all projects will be 30 September 2023.
• The three-day workshop for successful applicants will most likely be held in the week from 7 to 18 November 2022, subject to availability of attendees. 

Each application will be independently reviewed by three appropriately qualified reviewers, selected from within the PHA4GE Ethics and Data Sharing WG as well as outside reviewers who will be invited as appropriate.  The PHA4GE Ethics and Data Sharing WG will convene to discuss each reviewed application.

Characteristics that will be assessed will include:

• Originality
• Usefulness/relevance to the research community
• Relevance to the PHA4GE and the Ethics and Data Sharing WG mission (www.pha4ge.org)
• Feasibility, in the given time frame
• Evidence of clear organization, leadership and likelihood of success

3. Additional information

If applicants are successful, representatives  from those projects will be required to attend a three-day workshop together with the other awardees, members of the PHA4GE Ethics and Data Sharing Working group, and assigned project facilitators, in order to review and finalize their project plans, and participate in appropriate training. The costs of attending the workshop will be covered by the PHA4GE Ethics and Data Sharing Working Group.