Judicial police seized hepatitis B vaccine doses in Guinea-Bissau as a fight over research on African newborns hits a new flashpoint.
A fight over who gets to run health research on African babies just spilled into the streets of Guinea-Bissau. Judicial police raided the offices of a team of vaccine researchers and seized doses of hepatitis B vaccine, according to officials who announced the operation on Facebook.
The researchers are no ordinary targets. They have drawn public praise from US Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., and they sit at the center of a bitter dispute over studies involving newborns in the West African nation. The raid pushes a simmering controversy into open confrontation.
Money is part of the story. The research effort is backed by $1.6m from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, matched by the Pershing Square Foundation and the Bluebell Foundation, for a combined $3.2m. That is serious foreign funding riding on the health of African infants.
The bigger question reaches well beyond one country: who sets the rules, who gives consent, and who benefits when outside institutions bring trials to African communities? Health sovereignty is a live issue across the continent, and Guinea-Bissau's authorities have just made clear they intend to be heard on it. Expect more developments as the dispute plays out.
