Identifying evidence syntheses on COVID-19 to support the activities of the Belgian Red Cross

27/04/20

The day-to-day functioning of CEBaP has a clear emphasis on rigorously performed and transparently reported systematic literature reviews relevant to the humanitarian and development aid sector. The Belgian Red Cross is dedicated to assisting individuals, families and communities during the COVID-19 pandemic, and its response ranges from blood-related activities (e.g. testing donor blood for COVID-19 antibodies, collecting plasma of male donors recovered from COVID-19) to supporting crisis volunteers in Flanders, and awareness campaigns in several African countries. CEBaP assesses on a daily basis the most recently published COVID-19 studies, but in order to avoid cherry-picking of individual studies, it is important to look at the “body of evidence” for a certain topic, as soon as there are more studies available.

Current secondary research resources on COVID-19 are listed below:

• Campbell collaboration: meta-evidence blog  
• CEBM: Oxford COVID-19 Evidence Service
• EPPI Centre: COVID-19: living map of the evidence (only in Chrome)
• Cochrane Rapid Reviews
• NIPH: Live map of COVID-19 evidence
• NICE: Rapid guidelines and evidence summaries
• Evidence Aid: Coronavirus (COVID-19): Evidence Collection

By staying up-to-date with the best available evidence, CEBaP continuously supports the Belgian Red Cross in adapting to emerging needs and in optimal decision-making as this international crisis evolves.