This proposal concerns a comprehensive, multi-disciplinary, Africa-based education and training program in health research ethics. The partners in this consortium are the University of Pretoria (School of Health Systems and Public Health, School of Medicine, Centre for Human Rights, Faculty of Law, and Centre for Professional and Business Ethics), the University of Natal (School of Psychology, the H/V/AIDS Vaccine Ethics Group, and Medical School), and the Bioethics Institute at the Johns Hopkins University's Bloomberg School of Public Health. The collective will be known as the South African Research Ethics Training Initiative (SARETI). ? ? The overall goal of the SARETI training program is to build African capacity for the ethical review of health research, and to strengthen Africa's institutional training capacity necessary to achieve and sustain this aim. To achieve these goals, SARETI offers a Training and a Support program. SARETI Training comprises a multidisciplinary, modular Masters degree track with funding for 9 trainees over the 4-year period of this award; an advanced, non-degree program resulting in a Certificate with funding for 16 trainees; and a funded training program for 40 Ethics Review Committee members. More students are expected to participate using funding outside this award. The core of the advanced training program consists of i) modular learning at the partner institutions, ii) practical work with ethics review committees, iii) attendance of an intensive bioethics program through the Bioethics Institute, and iv) the completion of a dissertation / research paper on a topic of relevance to strengthening health research ethics at the trainee's home institution.The SARETI Support program will support continuous professional education of Africa-based faculty, and support the top trainees of the training programs to attend relevant health research ethics meetings. At the end of the 4th year of the program, SARETI will arrange an Africa-wide Health Research Ethics Symposium (AHRES) to increase the impact and networking potentials of the SARETI training programs, to facilitate African exchange in health research ethics, and to strengthen Africa's voice in this field, and to offer an opportunity for trainees to present their work to their peers. ? ? Non-core benefits include an Ethics Review Committee Training Program for distance learning, and submission of a request for supplemental funding for oral health professionals in Africa should this proposal be funded.
