Ethical problems in research with human subjects during the COVID-19 pandemic: integrative literature review

• Autor(a) principal: Pinto, Sandra
• Data de Publicação: 2020
• Outros Autores: Pessalacia, Juliana Dias Reis, Gazarini, Lucas, Silva Neto, Priscila Kelly da, Moreira, Adailson da Silva, Costa, Elton Fogaça da
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: por
• Título da fonte: Research, Society and Development
• Texto Completo: https://rsdjournal.org/index.php/rsd/article/view/10802
• topic: Ética em Pesquisa; Bioética; COVID-19; Pandemias.; Ética; Bioética; COVID-19; Pandemias.; Ethics; Bioethics; COVID-19; Pandemics.

Objective: To analyze publications that address ethical problems in research with human beings carried out during the COVID-19 pandemic. Method: an integrative review in order to answer the following guiding question: which publications address ethical problems in research with human beings during the COVID-19 pandemic? National and international publications, published from 01/01/2020 to 05/14/2020, in Portuguese, English or Spanish, were consulted in the MedLine/Pubmed databases, using the standardized descriptors MesH, Ethics, Research and COVID-19, combined using the Boolean operator AND. Results: 43 articles were found that met the selection criteria, of which 10 articles were selected based on the title and online summary with subsequent full reading, presented in two synoptic tables: one containing the title of the article, journal and year of publication and objective; and the other containing the challenges presented for research with human beings. The articles were grouped into three categories: Respect for the autonomy of research participants; Equity in allocating treatments to research participants and; Balancing the risks and benefits of studies in the pandemic period. Conclusion: Ethical issues referred to conflicts regarding the principles of biomedical ethics: autonomy, involving the difficult decision on the part of the participants between withdrawing or remaining in studies, as well as obtaining free and informed consent by the researcher in the context of the pandemic; and beneficence/non-maleficence, challenging in terms of management complexity in the sense of designing ethically and methodologically high-level studies that manage to minimize risks and maximize benefits in a timely manner.