Who leads Marburg virus research? Gender, geography and funding in authorship, 2008 to early 2023: a bibliometric baseline before the 2023-2025 outbreaks
- 1CognosX
Abstract
Introduction. Between 2023 and 2025, Marburg virus disease reached Equatorial Guinea, Tanzania, Rwanda and Ethiopia for the first time. WHO's 2025 Marburg research priorities make leadership of studies by local scientists a continuing goal. This study describes who led Marburg virus research before these outbreaks. Methods. I analysed 684 English-language Web of Science papers on Marburg virus published from 2008 to February 2023 (5,700 authorships). Gender was inferred from first names with Gender-API, papers about African countries were identified from their text, funders were harmonised by country and type, and themes were mapped to the WHO priorities. I used Wilson 95% confidence intervals (CIs) and logistic and negative binomial regression. Results. Women held 35.1% (95% CI 33.9-36.4) of authorships, 41.6% (37.9-45.4) of first-author and 19.6% (16.7-22.9) of last-author positions. Women last authors rose from 15.1% (2008-2012) to 23.2% (2018-2023). Only 14.6% of papers had an author based in Africa. Of 102 papers about an African country, 25.5% (18.0-34.7) had a first author and 23.5% (16.4-32.6) a last author from that country, below benchmarks for infectious-disease research in Africa. Women based in Africa were last author on 2 papers. Of funded papers, 69.0% acknowledged a US funder (24.0% a US defence agency) and 3.2% an African funder. WHO priorities on clinical care, outbreak trials, social science and capacity strengthening each appeared in fewer than 8% of papers. An apparent citation penalty for funded papers disappeared after adjustment (rate ratio 1.07, 0.87-1.33). Conclusions. Before the recent outbreaks, Marburg virus research was led mostly by men in senior positions and by researchers outside the affected countries, and was funded mainly by US agencies. This baseline can track whether recent African-led responses change who leads the field.
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BibTeX
@misc{fonkou2026leads,
title = {{Who leads Marburg virus research? Gender, geography and funding in authorship, 2008 to early 2023: a bibliometric baseline before the 2023-2025 outbreaks}},
author = {M. D. Mbogning Fonkou},
howpublished = {medRxiv},
year = {2026},
month = nov,
doi = {10.64898/2026.11.04.26367239},
url = {https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.11.04.26367239v1},
note = {CC BY},
}
RIS
TY - UNPB
TI - Who leads Marburg virus research? Gender, geography and funding in authorship, 2008 to early 2023: a bibliometric baseline before the 2023-2025 outbreaks
AU - M. D. Mbogning Fonkou
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/11/04
PB - medRxiv
DO - 10.64898/2026.11.04.26367239
UR - https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.11.04.26367239v1
AB - Introduction. Between 2023 and 2025, Marburg virus disease reached Equatorial Guinea, Tanzania, Rwanda and Ethiopia for the first time. WHO's 2025 Marburg research priorities make leadership of studies by local scientists a continuing goal. This study describes who led Marburg virus research before these outbreaks. Methods. I analysed 684 English-language Web of Science papers on Marburg virus published from 2008 to February 2023 (5,700 authorships). Gender was inferred from first names with Gender-API, papers about African countries were identified from their text, funders were harmonised by country and type, and themes were mapped to the WHO priorities. I used Wilson 95% confidence intervals (CIs) and logistic and negative binomial regression. Results. Women held 35.1% (95% CI 33.9-36.4) of authorships, 41.6% (37.9-45.4) of first-author and 19.6% (16.7-22.9) of last-author positions. Women last authors rose from 15.1% (2008-2012) to 23.2% (2018-2023). Only 14.6% of papers had an author based in Africa. Of 102 papers about an African country, 25.5% (18.0-34.7) had a first author and 23.5% (16.4-32.6) a last author from that country, below benchmarks for infectious-disease research in Africa. Women based in Africa were last author on 2 papers. Of funded papers, 69.0% acknowledged a US funder (24.0% a US defence agency) and 3.2% an African funder. WHO priorities on clinical care, outbreak trials, social science and capacity strengthening each appeared in fewer than 8% of papers. An apparent citation penalty for funded papers disappeared after adjustment (rate ratio 1.07, 0.87-1.33). Conclusions. Before the recent outbreaks, Marburg virus research was led mostly by men in senior positions and by researchers outside the affected countries, and was funded mainly by US agencies. This baseline can track whether recent African-led responses change who leads the field.
ER -