ABUJA – MAY 5, 2025

Nigeria has reaffirmed its commitment to ethical and transparent clinical research through the TRACE mission held in Abuja. The mission brought together the TRACE team and the NHREC as well as Institutional and local committees to strengthen clinical   trial   oversight. Stakeholders explored the potential measures to improve coordination and financial sustainability, including proposed ethics application fees across different research categories to fund review operations. Stakeholders also discussed the use of WHO Ethics Committee Benchmarking tools to support continuous quality improvement and strengthening ethics governance over time. The Honourable Minister of State for Health and Social Welfare, Dr. Iziaq Adekunle Salako endorsed the initiative, emphasizing the need for credible and ethical research.  

ADVANCING DIGITAL ETHICS AND RESEARCH GOVERNANCE

Nigeria is embracing a new era of digital innovation in clinical research oversight through the collaborative efforts of the TRACE Project.  In partnership with NHREC, the TRACE mission team supported the capacity building of the EC members for using the platform (NHREC E-Portal system), designed to digitize ethics review processes and streamline research protocol submissions.  

The successful rollout of the NHREC E-Portal and subsequent training of   ethics reviewers have demonstrated Nigeria’s commitment to advancing digital ethics systems. These reforms not only enhance the efficiency of research oversight but also contribute to TRACE’s wider mission of empowering African countries to build resilient, transparent, and harmonized research ethics frameworks that uphold global standards.

More than 60 ethics committee members were trained on the newly developed NHREC E-Portal system for digital protocol submission and review processes, marking a major step toward efficient and standardized ethics processes nationwide.