Can global health research partnerships regain normalcy after the pandemic?
By Ziyue Wang
It is no doubt that the outbreak of COVID-19 has disrupted many global health research projects and initiatives: many programs were halted due to international travel bans or other restrictions related to COVID-19; deep cuts in funding opportunities in many important research areas of global health, such as TB, HIV and malaria, have made the situation even worse. However, as a doctoral student and a researcher, I think the biggest problem in post-COVID global health research is that the politicization of COVID-19 has sharpened divisions between countries and created mistrust. In the past year, I have been dealing with numerous bureaucratic challenges in my own projects, both from Canada and China.
As a Chinese Ph.D. student who is conducting global health research at McGill, I’m planning to conduct my Ph.D. research project in two provinces of China in 2019. At that time, it was a perfect plan for me: I have 5-years of experience in developing public health projects in China; McGill has a first-class platform for global health training. Additionally, prior to the pandemic, Peking University (PKU) and McGill signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to pursue collaborations in research. All my committee members, PKU and McGill, thought this research effort was well-founded and encouraged me to conduct this joint research project. However, the fluctuating political climate between Canada and China afterwards changed everything. Due to the “cold war thinking” between China and the West, the China-Canada relationship have deteriorated significantly even before the pandemic –as illustrated by the extradition case of Meng Wanzhou. The pandemic has exacerbated these problems.
On the side of China, the symposiums between PKU and McGill in Beijing have been cancelled since 2020 because of travel restrictions. China also has increased their scrutiny of international research relationships with the official reasoning of “national security”. In September 2020, President Xi Jinping placed particular emphasis on Chinese scientists to “adhere to the supremacy of the national interest”. As circumstances changed and with changing guidelines from the government, I found that it has become much harder for me to develop partnerships I originally envisioned between McGill and Chinese Institutes. One of my Chinese research partners told me that my project needed special approval from their university since I was doing my PhD in an “overseas institution”. However, even after I submitted all the materials they requested, they never responded. At the same time, researchers in Canada, due to the fear of being caught up in geopolitical tensions, are also trying to keep their distance from Chinese researchers – this results in ‘othering’ of researchers such as myself. Last year, just like all other Canadian doctoral students, I submitted my funding application to FRQS and other funding institutions in Canada. During and after my application process, many told me that I will not get funded because “they won’t let you do projects in China with Canadian funds”. I also received some “well-meaning” reminders such as I should not let others know that my project is about China, or I could “get into trouble” – even though they themselves did not know what exactly these “troubles” would be. A senior researcher once told me privately that last year the Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences at McGill refused his request to sign an MOU with a Chinese university. The reason they offered to him is that university is lower ranked, and McGill should “work with peer and aspirant institutions”. However, he argued that this statement does not make any sense. For example, if you only refer to the ranking system, there will be no such institute as a “McGill peer university” in many other lower- and middle-income countries due to significant resource and training disparity. Does that mean that we should not collaborate with any academic institution that is perceived to be lower ranked? Whatever the “real” reason might be, the political concerns have curbed research ties between Canada and China, as we have seen in Alberta.
Although I am well aware of geo-politics impacting research partnerships, I also believe that “a friend in need is a friend indeed” - thus, as we face a more fractious reality globally, scientific collaborations have become even more vital. Especially as we navigate this pandemic and future global health threats. The SARS-CoV-2 genome sequences shared by Chinese scientists which later became the fundamental information to the designing of the mRNA vaccine, is one example of the power of collaboration. However, I have sadly seen that more and more people have forgotten the value of research cooperation across borders in the past two years. I believe that I am not alone in facing these challenges and that it is also not limited to research partnerships with China. Recently publications have shown that international collaborations have dropped in many research areas since the onset of the pandemic. The erosion of trust is the main reason behind the decrease in collaborations. As we look to solutions, we can start with ethical cooperation between scientific researchers as a first step to repairing relations between countries.
I hope that my concerns about collaboration in global health will be heard by policymakers, institutional heads, and other scholars all over the world. I also hope that my efforts in raising this concern as a researcher and a student can contribute to a discussion on developing more sustainable, mutually beneficial global health research partnerships, to support young scholars in global health research communities, and to achieve better health for all.
About the Author:
Ziyue Wang is a Ph.D. student in the Department of Family Medicine at McGill University. His research interests include health policy, social epidemiology, behavioral sciences, mixed-methods studies, and program evaluation. Prior to joining McGill, Ziyue completed his master’s in Health Policy and Management from China Center for Health Development Studies, Peking University Health Science Center. He has a bachelor’s degree from Fudan University, School of Public Health, and a double degree in economics from Peking University, National School of Development.
Ziyue tweets at @Ziyue00927266