The exposé by Rocket Science two weeks ago, detailing how UK scientists with their Kenyan backers might have gotten away with potential research malpractice, definitely left a nasty taste in the mouths of many.

Sita Ghimire, Seniro Scientist-Plant Pathology, Beca-Ilri, explaining the adavantages of brachiaria grass species, at the Kenya Agricultural and Livestock Research Organisation (KALRO), Machakos Centre. Photo/ Geoffrey Kamadi.

What got tongues wagging though, is that the Kenyan women participants involved in this study might have unwittingly risked their health over a treatment that had hitherto been untested.

This basis alone would most likely have disqualified such a research from ever taking off in the foreign scientists’ country of origin.

And this is despite the fact that the scientists now stand to gain massively over a potential cervical cancer treatment under development, while leaving their Kenyan counterparts out in the cold.

The British scientists and couple: Drs Ian and Lynn Hampson of the University of Manchester (UoM) lay claim to the invention.

The manufacturing rights have been awarded to the Douglas Pharmaceuticals of New Zealand, while the patent remains with the university.

“Kenyans have no ownership claim in any of this,” Dr Rich Ferrie, the director of Intellectual Property Ltd at the UoM is quoted by Rocket Science to have said.

He went on to explain that they (the Kenyan scientists) “did not invent anything, do not co-own the patent while future research and manufacture is the business of Douglas Pharmaceuticals of New Zealand.”

However crass, unethical or corrupt this may sound, sadly though, the incident is not without precedent, nor is there indication suggesting that it will be the last.

Given the Boot

The incident reminded me of a similar controversy involving a Kenyan scientist at the Kenya Medical Research Institute (KEMRI) – Wellcome Trust Research Programme (KWTRP).

Dr. Moses Ndiritu, with a Masters of Philosophy in Epidemiology from Cambridge University, initiated a paediatrics clinical and microbiology surveillance in Thika (40min drive east of Nairobi), with his local scientists in 2008.

However, in 2010, he would watch helplessly as his baby was yanked from him and handed over to a clinical epidemiologist at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, by the name of Alex Aiken, a move that would facilitate his PhD studies.

“Aiken had not participated whatsoever in setting up the project in Thika, yet here he comes after the project has been completed to take over my position and all of my work,” Ndiritu protested bitterly at the time.

He went on to allege that Aiken would source funding to boost further research efforts, while excluding him and his local colleagues.

“It was so painful to me, because I had worked for almost eight years preparing for my PhD. Now I am robbed of my brain,” he told reporters at the time.

Standards and Guidelines

A baboon captured for scientific experiment at the Institute of Primate Research (IPR) in Nairobi. This photo was obtained by the British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection (BUAV), known nowadays as Cruelty Free International in their undercover investigation.

Yet, in late 2013 I received an email notification from the Cruelty Free International (then known as the British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection), alerting me about alleged controversial experiments by UK researchers colluding with a Kenyan institution involving wild-caught baboons.

According to their undercover investigations at the Institute of Primate Research (IPR) in Kenya, they “uncovered the cruel capture, captivity and use of wild baboons in research.”

They explained that they had filmed some of the experiments involving researchers from Newcastle University in the UK.

The footage, they said, showed these researchers bypassing UK law, which banned the use of wild-caught primates in research in 1995 by travelling to Kenya to use baboons taken from the wild.

And in so doing, they were in breach of guidelines by UK funding bodies requiring UK researchers to maintain UK welfare standards when conducting research abroad.

Visiting researchers from the USA and Europe would subject these baboons to disturbing experiments at the IPR.

I reached out to Dr. Thomas Kariuki – the then director at IPR (he is the current Director of the African Academy of Sciences- Alliance for Accelerating Excellence in Science in Africa) seeking an explanation and therefore clear the air.

He told me that the removal of abundant animals from the wild is both a species management issue as well as a source of animals for much needed medical research on diseases that impose a high burden on Kenyans and on the global stage.

He further elaborated that they only use abundant, non-endangered species under the International Union for Conservation of Nature list for biomedical research.

This includes “baboons and the African Green Monkeys, which are removed from areas of the country where the (Kenya) Wildlife Service has determined that they are present in unmanageable numbers and have become agricultural pests,” he said.

And on the specific question of observing research guidelines, Kariuki offered: “We carry out the trapping exercise using the highest levels of technical expertise and standards for animal welfare.”

Our Plant Species Are Not Exempt Either

Some scientists have questioned the wisdom behind handing a blank cheque to their counterparts from overseas, when it comes to research in Kenya and Africa. Dr. Augustus Temu, at the World Agroforestry Centre is one such scientist.

 Faidherbia (Acacia) albida also known in Swahili as mkababu or mgunga and as white-thorn and white acacia tree in English among many other names is a tree species found nowhere else but in Kenya and elsewhere in Africa.

It is one among many fertiliser trees, which captures nitrogen from the atmosphere and fixing it in the soil, thereby enriching it and reducing the need for synthetic fertilizer.

Dr. Matemu was not for the idea of having the genetic sequencing of this tree species being conducted by the Beijing Genomics Institute of China. The Institute is also conducting genetic sequencing of the baobab tree.

“The result of such work will be owned by those institutions conducting the analysis,” he said.

According to him, the upshot of such analysis is that the genetic material can be used to put into other crops and before you know it, we have a different tree, with similar characteristics as our own.

“This is where Africa could easily lose intellectual property to many other countries that are currently exploiting our forests, and not for the actual product but also for the intellectual property which are even more valuable,” he lamented.

There is then the story of the brachiaria grass species, which was taken from the Kitale region of Kenya in the 1970s and taken to South America.

Also going by the name of Mombasa and Tanzania grass, this species is said to have revolutionised the livestock industry in Brazil and elsewhere in the world.

Recent studies have shown that brachiaria increased milk production of 37 per cent compared to napier grass over a four-month period and increased the average daily weight gain by 205g/day for a 12 week period.

Interestingly however, even though the grass originated from Kenya, farmers willing to plant it have to source seeds from a company outside the country, simply because they are not readily available locally.

And then there is the case of the Red Maasai Sheep which is resistant to worm infection. The sheep’s genetic sequencing is said to be conducted in South Africa.

All this is happening simply because African countries lack capacity to conduct some of the research, including genetic sequencing, for example. Continue Reading