In view of the obvious need to address, at the international level, the ethical issues raised by epidemiological studies, CIOMS, in collaboration with the World Health Organization, undertook in 1989 a project to develop such guidelines. A first draft was prepared on the basis of a series of extensive consultations with experts in many countries and organizations. It was considered and amended in March 1990 at the first meeting of the CIOMS Steering Committee for the Project on the Development of International Guidelines for Epidemiological Studies; in August of the same year it was reviewed by the International Workshop on Ethics, Health Policy and Epidemiology, organized by the International Epidemiological Association. In the light of the comments and suggestions received, the next draft was elaborated and widely distributed for comments; it was the main subject of the XXVth CIOMS International Conference, in November 1990. The Conference, attended by some 110 participants from 35 countries and representing a wide variety of backgrounds, heard and discussed a series of papers which covered comprehensively the issues involved, and made useful comments and suggestions for the further elaboration and amendment of the guidelines. After the Conference the Steering Committee continued its work and met again in July 1991, when it approved the present text, recommending its publication and wide distribution. The Committee stressed the need to test the guidelines in practice and after a suitable period to revise them in the light of experience. The guidelines are designed to enable countries to define national policy on the ethics of epidemiological research and practice, adopt ethical standards for their specific national needs, and establish adequate mechanisms for ethical review of epidemiological studies.
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A 1991 study studied this question.