Ethical policy
ETHICS IN RESEARCH
All research articles published by Microbes, Infection and Chemotherapy are subject to rigorous ethical standards. The journal subscribes to the Code of Conduct of the Publication Ethics Committee (COPE) and the International Standards for Editors and Guidelines for Authors of COPE. All authors must comply with the Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts Submitted to Biomedical Journals. The journal also endorses the World Association of Medical Editors (WAME) Policy Statement on Geopolitical Intrusion into Editorial Decisions.
HUMAN RESEARCH
Articles that include research results involving human beings must follow the ethical principles of the Helsinki Declaration of the World Medical Association and comply with specific legislation (when applicable) of the country in which the research was carried out.
Articles that present research results involving human beings must clearly affirm the above compliance in the body of the article and must have been approved by an ethics committee in research duly established for that purpose.
In the case of reports, each manuscript on clinical cases and clinical series must be accompanied by a letter with the written authorization of the patient(s) or their instructor(s) to publish the clinical data and images corresponding to the article. If it is impossible to obtain this documentation, it may be replaced by a letter issued by the head of the hospital where the patient(s) was treated, specifying that the institution supports the publication of the case / clinical series for scientific reasons.
The editors of Microbes, Infection and Chemotherapy, reserve the right to request additional information on the ethical procedures used in the research. The journal retains the right to reject any manuscript based on unethical conduct in either human or animal studies.
ANIMAL RESEARCH
For animal studies, authors should consider international standards for the use of experimental animals, primarily those recommended by the Office of Animal Care and Use of National Institutes of Health (http://www.uss.cl/wp-content /uploads/2014/12/Gui%CC%81a-para-el-Cuidado-y-Uso-de-los-Animales-de-Laboratorio.pdf), as well as the guidelines of the participating institution or national laws on the care and use of laboratory animals of the country where the study was carried out.
The animals used must be named in the title, summary, keywords, material and methods. Such experimentation must be thoroughly detailed in the materials and methods section.
If the editors or reviewers believe these recommendations have not been adequately adhered to in the research paper, the manuscript will be immediately rejected.
CLINICAL TRIALS REGISTER
Microbes, Infection and Chemotherapy support initiatives to improve clinical trial reporting. This includes prospective registration of clinical trials in appropriate and publicly available databases. Thus, and following the ICMJE guidelines, Microbes, Infection and Chemotherapy require the registration of all clinical trials, which must be described in the submitted manuscripts.
MANUSCRIPT RETRACTION POLICY
Microbes, Infection and Chemotherapy may withdraw articles based on information from authors, academic or institutional sponsors, or publishers due to widespread error or unproven or irreproducible data. We adhere to the guidelines the COPE gave (https://doi.org/10.24318/cope.2019.1.4) relative to the causes of retraction for published articles, which are
a. Failure to comply with requirements in the editorial process
b. The proven falsity of information and with which the editorial process was advanced.
c. The verification of bad editorial practices by the authors.
d. Failure to comply with the ethical principles that should have been observed.
e. Deliberately include inaccurate information.
EDITORIAL MEMBERS AND EDITORS
Editorial board members and editors must declare any conflict of interest when conducting the editorial process of manuscripts submitted to the journal.
In addition, they must be excluded from handling manuscripts in cases where there is a declared conflict of interest. These conflicts may be having previously published with one or more of the authors or having the same affiliation as one or more of the authors.
EDITOR AS AN AUTHOR
When an editor or member of the editorial board is on the list of authors, she must declare it in the conflicts of interest section of the submitted manuscript. This manuscript will be assigned to another editor or editorial board member to take responsibility for supervising peer review.
Members of the Editorial Board can submit articles to the journal. These submissions are subject to the same review process as any other manuscript. Manuscripts submitted by authors do not have priority over other manuscripts, and editorial board member status does not influence the editorial decision.
REVIEWERS
Reviewers should disclose to editors any conflicts of interest that could alter their views of the manuscript and should refrain from reviewing specific manuscripts if the potential for bias exists. Silence by reviewers regarding potential conflicts may mean that conflicts exist and have not been disclosed by the reviewer or that conflicts do not exist; therefore, Microbes, Infection and Chemotherapy, in the editorial management system, asks reviewers to explicitly indicate whether or not conflicts exist. Reviewers may not use the privilege of knowing the manuscript for their own benefit.
