Gender inequity in cancer research leadership in Europe: Time to act.

AIM: Cancer is one of Europe's key research missions, with gender equity a major policy pillar. To benchmark how well European countries perform for gender balance in cancer research, high quality intelligence is required. METHODS: For cancer research papers in Europe (EUR31; the 28 EU Member States plus Iceland, Norway and Switzerland) from two specific years (2009 and 2019), we evaluated the numbers of female authors overall and then the female last-author presence, as a proxy of female cancer research leadership. RESULTS: Overall, female authorship increased from 42% to 49%. In 2009, females represented 50% or more of cancer research authors in only five EUR31 countries. By 2019, that number had risen to 17. In Eastern European (EE) countries, females were more likely to be in the majority. The presence of female cancer research authors in the last (senior) author position increased from 24% to 34%. Five of the top six countries for female authorship in 2019 were from EE, whereas disappointingly four central European countries (Austria (AT), Czechia (CZ), Germany (DE) and Switzerland (CH)) were below the 25th percentile. A number of European powerhouses of cancer research (UK, DE, CH) underperformed in terms of female cancer research leadership. However, when cancer researchers from these countries worked abroad (e.g. Scandinavia, USA) the percentage of females was similar to that of their host countries. A factor potentially influencing female cancer research participation was availability and relative cost of child-care, which is more favourable in Scandinavia and EE than in central/western Europe. CONCLUSION: Our data show that Horizon Europe's Cancer Mission must ensure gender equity in its future research programmes and support the enhancement of female cancer research leadership opportunities.

UK newspaper reporting of the NHS cancer drugs fund, 2010 to 2015: a retrospective media analysis.

Objective We wished to explore how UK national newspapers had covered the creation and operation of the Cancer Drugs Fund from 2010 to 2015. This was introduced to provide cancer patients in England with access to drugs not appraised or approved by the National Institute for health and Care Excellence. Design We sought stories in nine newspapers from the Factiva database, and copied their salient details to a spreadsheet. They were categorised by whether they were supportive or critical of the Cancer Drugs Fund and their main arguments, which drugs they mentioned and for which cancers. Settings Not applicable Participants Not applicable Main outcome results Press coverage was mainly very positive, arguing for the Cancer Drugs Fund's extension to Scotland and Wales, and a bigger budget, but neglecting the lack of patient benefit and the severe side effects that sometimes occurred. Leading this support was the Daily Mail, whose influence (measured by the product of number of stories and the paper's circulation) was almost greater than that of the other newspapers combined. Results Press coverage was mainly very positive, arguing for the Cancer Drugs Fund's extension to Scotland and Wales, and a bigger budget, but neglecting the lack of patient benefits and the severe side effects that sometimes occurred. Leading this support was the Daily Mail, whose influence (measured by the product of number of stories and the paper's circulation) was almost greater than that of the other newspapers combined. Conclusions Although there was some critical analysis of the Cancer Drugs Fund, our analysis shows that most press coverage was largely positive and unrepresentative in comparison with the lack of overall benefits to patients and society. It is likely that it contributed to the Cancer Drugs Fund's continuation despite mounting evidence of its ineffectiveness.

Lung cancer researchers, 2008-2013: their sex and ethnicity.

This paper describes the process by which almost all authors of papers in the Web of Science (WoS) can be characterised by their sex and ethnicity or national background, based on their names. These are compared with two large databases of surnames and given names to determine to which of some 160 different ethnic groups they are most likely to belong. Since 2008 the authors of WoS papers are tagged with their addresses, and many have their given names if they appear on the paper, so the workforce composition of each country can be determined. Conversely, the current location of members of particular ethnic groups can be found. This will show the extent of a country's "brain drain", if any. Key results are shown for one subject area, and inter alia it appears that the majority of researchers of Indian origin who are active in lung cancer research are working in the USA. But East Asians (Chinese, Japanese and Koreans) tend to stay in their country of birth.

The contribution of ethnic groups to Malaysian scientific output, 1982-2014, and the effects of the new economic policy.

Malaysia has three main ethnic communities: Chinese, Indians and Malays. At independence in 1957, the Chinese dominated commercial life, and this led to ethnic tensions and finally riots. As a result in 1969 Malaysia introduced a "New Economic Policy" (NEP) to promote Malays in all areas of activity, and in particular to assist them to obtain basic and higher education. We examined the scientific outputs from Malaysia between 1982 and 2014 and classified the names of Malaysian researchers into one of these three groups and two others. There was a major increase in Malay participation in research, which has risen from 20 % of researchers in 1982-1984 to 65 % in 2012-2014, with corresponding declines in the percentages of Chinese and Indian authors, although their absolute numbers have increased because Malaysian scientific output has increased so rapidly in the last 10 years. The huge increase in Malay researchers contrasts with their presence in the Malaysian population which has remained stable at about 50 % since 1969.

The State of Lung Cancer Research: A Global Analysis.

INTRODUCTION: Lung cancer is the leading cause of years of life lost because of cancer and is associated with the highest economic burden relative to other tumor types. Research remains at the cornerstone of achieving improved outcomes of lung cancer. We present the results of a comprehensive analysis of global lung cancer research between 2004 and 2013 (10 years). METHODS: The study used bibliometrics to undertake a quantitative analysis of research output in the 24 leading countries in cancer research internationally on the basis of articles and reviews in the Web of Science (WoS) database. RESULTS: A total of 32,161 lung cancer research articles from 2085 different journals were analyzed. Lung cancer research represented only 5.6% of overall cancer research in 2013, a 1.2% increase since 2004. The commitment to lung cancer research has fallen in most countries apart from China and shows no correlation with lung cancer burden. A review of key research types demonstrated that diagnostics, screening, and quality of life research represent 4.3%, 1.8%, and 0.3% of total lung cancer research, respectively. The leading research types were genetics (20%), systemic therapies (17%), and prognostic biomarkers (16%). Research output is increasingly basic science, with a decrease in clinical translational research output during this period. CONCLUSIONS: Our findings have established that relative to the huge health, social, and economic burden associated with lung cancer, the level of world research output lags significantly behind that of research on other malignancies. Commitment to diagnostics, screening, and quality of life research is much lower than to basic science and medical research. The study findings are expected to provide the requisite knowledge to guide future cancer research programs in lung cancer.