The state of health economic research in South Africa
This article critically reviews the recent PharmacoEconomics article “The state of health economic research in South Africa: a systematic review”. The authors argue that the article fails to adequately review what is actually happening in the health economics field in South Africa, and that although there are limitations in the methodology of systematic reviews, these limitations are not adequately discussed and various other key issues are overlooked. Key issues discussed include narrow search parameters, arbitrary and subjective criteria, the exclusion of books, lack of acknowledgement of the academic community, marginalization or omission of key researchers, unsystematic searching, failure to take into account the political situation of South Africa, and finally, the use of outdated articles to support their views as to the current state of health economics in South Africa.