How community members in Uganda perceive controlled human infection studies.

Controlled Human Infection studies are a new and uncommon way of conducting clinical research in low resource settings. Regardless of the supposed importance of human infection studies in advancing clinical research, there is still limited literature on community perceptions of this field of research, particularly in low-resource settings. An exploratory qualitative study involving 107 community members organized into 16 focussed groups was conducted in Kampala city and Buikwe district in central Uganda between September 2023 and March 2024. The groups comprised market vendors, secondary school teachers, university students, media professionals/journalists, mosques/church attendants and Community Advisory Board members. Data were analysed using a systematic inductive analysis approach. While community members across all deliberative focus group discussions acknowledged the potential of human infection studies to accelerate the development of therapeutics for infectious diseases that disproportionately affect low-income countries, the majority viewed deliberate infection method as difficult to accept at the moment. Several would not be willing to participate in controlled human infection study due to the perceived fear of death and associated long term consequences, infrastructural challenges, mistrust of scientists, cultural and religious beliefs. Deliberate effective engagement with the community may enhance community acceptability of controlled human infection studies. Such engagement should use contextually appropriate messages to create awareness and augment acceptability of the human infection method in low resource settings.