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Guinea-Bissau has halted a proposed hepatitis B vaccine trial designed to enrol
Guinea-Bissau has halted a proposed hepatitis B vaccine trial designed to enrol around 14,000 newborns, following an international debate over its ethical design. The study, run by a Danish-based research group, would have given half the enrolled infants a birth-dose vaccine and delayed the shot for the other half — an approach health specialists argued contradicted World Health Organization guidelines and risked exposing babies to serious harm in a country where hepatitis B infection rates are among the world's highest. Authorities paused the project earlier in 2026 and launched a formal review; police later searched the research facility and seized a batch of vaccines. Defenders of the study argued it sought to generate new evidence on the optimal vaccination schedule. When a foreign-funded health study is cancelled in a lower-income country over ethical concerns, who do you think should have the final say over whether it proceeds?