Being a woman researcher in dangerous laboratories: biosafety level 3 and tuberculosis

Studies on the tuberculosis pathogen Mycobacterium tuberculosis bacillus require a biosafety level 3 laboratory. This study aims to investigate the gender distribution of researchers working in the most hazardous tuberculosis laboratory.

In this study, the original articles indexed in Web of Science between 1970 and 2021, which include phenotypic testing methods in which the susceptibility results of drugs used in the treatment of tuberculosis are determined, were reviewed.

As a result of our analysis, it was found that female researchers were included as first name in the publications at a rate of 49%, unlike other fields of science, and 51% came from lower-middle-income and upper-middle-income countries. According to the incidence rates announced by the World Health Organization in the years when the articles were published, it was seen that female researchers participated in more studies in regions with a high incidence of tuberculosis to ('x̄' = 89.94).

According to our data, it was found that the proportion of female researchers was high in the laboratory with a high risk of contamination of biosafety level 3. The high proportion of female researchers in hazardous areas is striking.