Association of funding and conflicts of interest on outcomes reported in published studies of Covid-19.

Background: An outbreak of the Covid-19 has led to substantial mortality globally. The entire world is carrying out studies to understand the pathophysiology, clinical features, diagnosis and treatment of Covid-19. We investigated the possible association of type of funding, corporate or academic, and conflict of interests on the outcomes reported in clinical trials on Covid-19.

Methods: Studies containing the keywords "clinical trial" AND "Covid 19" or "Corona" were located by a search on PubMed published between September 2019 to August 2021. Filters were used to select only papers in the English language and on "humans". The data were analysed using descriptive statistics and the Chi-square test.

Results: We found a significant association between the existence of a conflict of interest and reporting of a positive outcome (X2 value = 18.751, p less than 0.001). We also found a significant association between industry funding and reporting of a positive outcome (X2 value = 18.041, p less than 0.001).

Conclusion: We conclude from this study that the presence of conflict of interest and pharmaceutical industry funding is associated with reporting a positive outcome.