Ethical approval -what is the need?

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Ethical approval has been made mandatory for studies except for retrospective studies, online surveys, surveys where no personal data is collected and for studies where established therapies are used and no experimental intervention is done. But there are many journals that insist on ethical approval even for these 4 cases. Ridiculous!

Ethical committee approval -The sham!

But my question is-what's the need? Because when you say there is a need, you are assuming a number of things -

1. That the ethical committee is a competent one

2. That the ethical committee is an independent authority 

3. That the ethical committee does not do any biases or prejudices

4. That the ethical committee is acting under no pressure 

5. That the ethical committee has full knowledge of each and every subject of the study 

6. That the ethical committee decision is always right 

7. That after approval, the study did go as per the protocol 

Considering that humans can never be assumed to follow these lines, having an ethical committee approval has no meaning. There are innumerable examples including from the developed world where ethical committee approved projects functioned unethically. On the other hand, there are some non-ethical committee approved projects that would in fact follow all guidelines properly. 

In that case, ethical committee approval is a hurdle for good studies. Such good studies remain out of the reader's domain due to the obstruction created by the unnecessary need of ethics approval for any study. Many domains remain uncovered due to the need of ethics approval. 

So journals should stop asking for ethical committee clearance for publishing studies. It actually means nothing and good studies remain invisible. This is a crime! Let every individual be an ethical person. Ethical approval does not guarantee that the person and study has followed all protocols well. There were innumerable studies even before this concept of ethics approval came in. When they did not harm, why will harm be done now? And despite the ethical committee approval, harm is still going on albeit in a hidden form!

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