Policy on the declaration of ethics in publications and conduct of good

O Boletim Epidemiológico Paulista (BEPA) is a technical-scientific publication of the Coordination of Disease Control (DCC), an entity within the Department of Health of São Paulo State (SES-SP) - responsible for planning and implementing health promotion actions and prevention of any risks, injuries, and diseases in the various areas covered by the Unified Health System (SUS), e-ISSN 1806-4272, is dedicated to complying with good practices with regard to moral conduct in scientific journal publishing, based on the COPE (Committee on Publication Ethics) code of conduct. Preventing negligence is also a crucial responsibility of the editor and editorial team: any form of unethical behaviour, as well as plagiarism in any instance, is not accepted at BEPA. Authors who submit articles to the journal declare that their content is original and guarantee that the work has not been published or is in the process of being reviewed/evaluated in any other journal.

In addition, BEPA is committed to ethics and quality in publishing. We support standards of ethical behaviour expected of all parties involved in publishing in our journal: the author, the journal editor, the reviewers and the publisher. We do not accept plagiarism or any other unethical behaviour.

Editors' duties:

• Publication decision: The journal editor is responsible for deciding which of the articles submitted to the journal should be published. The editor is guided by the policies of the journal's editorial board and in strict compliance with legal requirements regarding libel, copyright infringement and plagiarism. The editor may consult the editorial board or contributors in making decisions.
• Fair Rules: The editor must evaluate manuscripts for their intellectual content, without distinction as to race, gender, sexual orientation, religious belief, ethnic origin, nationality, or the political philosophy of the authors.
• Confidentiality: The editor and any editorial team must not disclose any information about a submitted manuscript to anyone other than the author, reviewers, potential collaborators, other editorial advisors, and the editor, as appropriate.
• Disclosure and Conflicts of Interest: The editor must not use unpublished information in his/her own research without the express written consent of the author. The editor must refrain from evaluating manuscripts in which he/she has any conflict of interest resulting from competitive or collaborative relationships or any other type of relationship or connections with any of the authors, companies or (possibly) institutions that are linked/connected to the articles.
• Participation and cooperation in investigations: The editor must take reasonable response measures when ethical complaints have been lodged in relation to a submitted manuscript or published article.

Reviewers' duties:

• Contribution to Editorial Decision: Peer review assists the editor in making editorial decisions and through editorial communications with the author can also assist the author in improving the article.
• Timeliness: Any selected referee who does not feel qualified to evaluate the research reported in a manuscript or knows that their immediate review will be impossible should notify the editor and excuse themselves from the review process.
• Confidentiality: All manuscripts received for review must be treated as confidential documents. They should not be shown to or discussed with others.
• Objectivity standards: Comments should be conducted objectively and reviewers should express their opinions clearly with supporting arguments.
• Source acknowledgment: Peer reviewers should identify relevant published works that have not been cited by the authors. The reviewer should also draw the editor's attention to any substantial similarity or overlap between the manuscript in question and any other published document of which they have personal knowledge.
• Disclosure and Conflicts of Interest: Inside information or ideas obtained through peer review must be kept confidential and not used for personal gain. Reviewers should not consider manuscripts in which they have any conflict of interest resulting from competitive or collaborative relationships or any other type of relationship or connections with any of the authors, companies or (possibly) institutions that are linked/connected to the articles.

Authors' duties:

• Reporting Standards: Authors of original research reports should present an accurate account of the work carried out, as well as an objective analysis of its significance. Underlying data must be presented accurately in the paper. A document must contain sufficient detail and references to enable others to replicate the work. Fraudulent or intentionally inaccurate statements constitute unethical behaviour and are unacceptable.
• Originality and Plagiarism: Authors must ensure that their works are entirely original, and if authors have used the work and/or words of other authors these must have been properly cited or quoted. Plagiarism in all its forms constitutes unethical publishing behaviour and is unacceptable.
• Multiple, redundant or competing publications: An author should generally not publish manuscripts describing essentially the same research in more than one journal or primary publication. Submitting the same manuscript to more than one journal simultaneously and/or publishing the same article in different journals constitutes unethical publishing behaviour and is unacceptable.
• Acknowledgment of Sources: Proper acknowledgment of the work of others should always be made. Authors should cite publications that have been influential in determining the nature of the work reported. Information obtained in a private capacity, such as in conversation, correspondence, or discussion with a third party, should not be used or reported without explicit written permission from the source. Information obtained in the course of confidential services, such as refereeing manuscripts or grant applications, should not be used without the explicit written permission of the author of the work involved in those services.
• Article Authorship: Authorship should be limited to those who made a significant contribution to the conception, design, execution or interpretation of the reported study. All those who have made significant contributions should be listed as co-authors. Others who have participated in certain substantive aspects of the research project should also be recognized or listed as contributors. The author should ensure that all appropriate and no inappropriate co-authors are included in the article, and that all co-authors have seen and approved the final version of the document and agreed to its submission for publication.
• Disclosure and Conflicts of Interest: All authors must disclose in their manuscripts any financial or substantive/material conflicts of interest that could lead to influencing the results or interpretations in their manuscripts. All sources of financial support for the project must be disclosed.
• Fundamental errors in published works: When an author discovers a significant error or inaccuracy in his or her own published work, it is the author's obligation to immediately notify the journal editor or publisher and cooperate with the editor to retract or correct the article.

Publisher's duties

We are committed to ensuring that obtaining advertising, reprint or other commercial revenue has no impact or influence on editorial decisions.

We are in the process of acquiring a plagiarism detection system. In the coming months, all submitted articles will be reviewed using plagiarism detection and similarity software to ensure the quality of scientific publications.

(*) This Ethics Policy is based on recommendations from Elsevier and COPE - Committee on Publication Ethics - Best Practice Guidelines for Journal Editors.