Authorship patterns in cancer genomics publications across Africa
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Date
2021
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
JCO Global Onco
Abstract
PURPOSE Authorship is a proxy indicator of research capacity. Understanding the research capacity is imperative for developing population-specific cancer control strategies. This is particularly apropos for African
nations, where mortality from cancer is projected to surpass that from infectious disease and the populations are
critically under-represented in cancer and genomics studies. Here, we present an analysis and discussion of the
patterns of authorship in Africa as they pertain to cancer genomics research across African countries.
METHODS PubMed metadata of relevant cancer genomics peer-reviewed publications on African populations,
published between January 1, 1990, and December 31, 2019, were retrieved and analyzed for patterns of
authorship affiliation using R packages, RISmed, and Pubmed.mineR.
RESULTS The data showed that only 0.016% (n = 375) of cancer publications globally were on cancer genomics
of African people. More than 50% of the first and last authors of these publications originated from the North
African countries of Tunisia, Morocco, Egypt, and Algeria. South Africa (13.6% and 12.7%) and Nigeria (2.2%
and 1.9%) were the Sub-Saharan African countries most represented by first and last authorship positions,
respectively. The United States contributed 12.6% of first and last authored papers, and nearly 50% of all
African countries had no contributing author for the publications we reviewed.
CONCLUSION This study highlights and brings awareness to the paucity of cancer genomics research on African
populations and by African authors and identifies a need for concerted efforts to encourage and enable more
research in Africa, needed for achieving global equity in cancer outcomes.
Description
Keywords
cancer, genomics, Africans, Digital Development, ACE: Applied Informatics and Communication, CAPiC, Covenant University, Nigeria