Updated on: 2020-05-05
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| Q1A. What arrangements, if any, do you have in place to ensure scientific advice informs national policy and decision making in relation to Covid-19? | The Ministry of Health, the Costa Rican Social Security Department and the National Emergency Commission are leading the country´s response to COVID-19. The Executive Branch has enacted a National Emergency Decree No° 42227 – MP- S of March 16th 2020 to establish actions, works and services necessary to solve the emergency, safeguard the health and life of the population, preserve public order and protect the environment. The decisions are based mainly on the OMS and OPS recommendations and according to the Costa Rican capacities. So far this has included the closing of schools and universities, shuttering of bars and sporting and entertainment events, gyms and other non- essential business where people congregate. Churches and religious services are also suspended. A ban on traffic from 10pm to 5am until further notice is also in effect and public transportation has been reduced. A ban on incoming non-Costa Rican passengers and non-essential air travel has also been placed in effect. All public institutions have been ordered to operate with no more than 20% of their workforce. All other employees must telecommute. Also, the country has developed national guidelines for the surveillance of COVID-19. The guidelines have been elaborated by a working team made up of researchers and professionals of different institutions (Ministry of Health, Costa Rican Social Security Department, Institute for Research and Teaching in Nutrition and Health (INCIENSA), Costa Rica University with the advice of the Pan-American Health Organization). The guidelines include general characteristics, operative definitions (suspicious case, probable case, confirmed case), confirmation and dismissal of cases, epidemiological surveillance procedures, and social risk communication. Additionally, several protocols, regulations, and measures have been taken by other entities before COVID-19, strategies, guides, and recommendations. To access specific protocols, regulations, and guides, refer to link: https://www.ministeriodesalud.go.cr/inde... |
| Q1B. In what ways, if any, are you coordinating on Covid-19 STI responses at international level? | The President of the Republic of Costa Rica, Mr. Carlos Alvarado, presented to Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO), an initiative calling for an immediate effort to improve access to technologies allowing for detection, prevention, control and treatment of the pandemic. The letter suggested the creation of a database focusing on research and development related to COVID-19 activities, including estimates of costs of clinical trials and subsidies provided by governments and charities. This should be a free access repository, or at least, with reasonable and affordable licensing of all the existing knowledge that serves to deal with this emergency. It might include patents granted and, in the process, to be granted, test data submitted to regulatory authorities, expert and technical knowledge, cell culture information, copyrights, and designs for the manufacture of diagnostic tests, devices, as well as drugs or vaccines. As an answer to Costa Rica´s petition, WHO is driving to open the licenses to treat COVID-19. Also, the Ministry of science, technology, and telecommunications has been part of several international virtual forums, where Costa Rica has reported on its Covid-19 response strategy. The Minister participated in the global meeting of the ministers of science and technology organized by UNESCO Paris, and in the Latin American forum organized by World Economic Forum last March. Additionally, the Minister of Science, Technology, and Telecommunications was invited to be part of the Regional Action Group for Latin America of WEF to enable a high-level dialogue among select decision-makers from government, business, civil society, and experts. This group aims to enhance public-private cooperation and coordinate effective responses to address the economic, political, and social impact of the pandemic, avoid a major systemic breakdown and help shape the region’s long-term future. The Ministry of Science, Technology, and Telecommunications is leading the organization of the Latin American minister forum in cooperation with the CEPAL. The goal of this is to understand and share the actions that Latin American and Caribbean countries are implementing to fight COVID-19 and to identify possibilities of cooperation between countries. The meeting will be on May 7th, this meeting will be in the framework of the Science, Innovations, and Tics Conference of CEPAL where Costa Rica is the current Chair. |
| Q2.Do you have dedicated arrangements in place for communicating science advice and for refuting misleading information to the public on Covid-19? | Communication from authorities has been informative and consistent. The official channel to communicate information regarding the emergency is the Ministry of Health — headed by Minister Daniel Salas, who has a medical degree, a background in epidemiology and a degree in public health. Every day he leads a nationally televised press conference in which he and other national authorities share official data of the country based in the data register of the social security system and the institutions accredited and authorized. When there is a cybersecurity risk, the center of the Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT) in Costa Rica, led by the Ministry of Science, Technology, and Telecommunications, generate warnings about the risk through their network contacts in the public, private, national, and international. |
| Q3. What new STI policy measures, if any, is your country taking to respond specifically to the Covid-19 crisis? | The government has opened a call for non-refundable funds to offer training, technical assistance and specialized support to SMEs in the areas of electronic commerce, innovation management, digital transformation, operational excellence and productive transformation towards the bioeconomy, with the aim of helping SMEs to optimize, reorient or complement their productive activities, so that they have better tools to cope with and overcome the economic situation owing to the COVID-19 emergency. Also, the Ministry of Science, Technology and Communications has enabled 791 million colones to finance actions in innovation, science and technology in order to fight COVID-19. The first call opened on April 16 and is part of the Innovation and Human Capital for Competitiveness Program (PINN), with the support of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB). These funds apply for innovation and technology transfer projects to support the health emergency, with an investment of up to ₵712 million. The maximum amount to be awarded per project will be ₵142,000,000 and the maximum execution period will be 12 months. Meanwhile, the Incentive Fund will open on May 15 a call for up to ₵79 million to support research on issues related to COVID-19. The Clodomiro Picado Institute obtained financing of ₵35 million from CONICIT to start the development of a possible treatment against COVID-19. The Biotechnology Nacional Research Center (CENIBIOT in Spanish) is working on the development of a low cost Covid-19 detection protocol, based on PCR (polymer chain reaction), in conjunction with the University of Costa Rica, the Technological Institute of Costa Rica and Inciensa Research Center. Further information on the call can be found at the link: https://micit.go.cr/12-proyectos-innovac... |
| Q4A. At national level, what mechanisms are you developing or relying upon to bring together different STI actors (researchers, industry, government, health sector, foundations, etc.) to effectively collaborate on responses to Covid-19? | The Ministry of Science, Technology and Telecommunications and the Costa Rican National Learning Institute, with the support of experts from the Health Ministry and Social Security Institution, have assembled a task force and launched the collaborative platform “colabcr”, an open community of people from all over the country (from the public, private sectors, academia and civil society) to design and produce medical protection supplies, detection / screening tests, to design and manufacture assisted ventilation devices, and to support laboratories with PCR capabilities. https://colab.design.cr/#!/home As part of this process we have created a task force to: 1. Promote research and development of assisted ventilation devices, face shields and screening tests, to support the national hospital system in the event of an eventual collapse during the COVID-19 virus crisis. 2. Guarantee the minimum necessary in this class of medical devices in order to optimize evaluation and approval times. 3. Guarantee the biological safety of front-line personnel in the national hospital network. 4. Guarantee the safety and health of patients who require the use of emergency medical equipment. 5. Provide assistance and scientific, design and engineering support to interested participating groups to optimize and accelerate the design and development processes of these devices. 6. Enlist the support of the country's business sector for the mass manufacture of these devices. |
| Q4B. At international level, what mechanisms are you developing or relying upon to bring together different STI actors (researchers, industry, government, health sector, foundations, etc.) to effectively collaborate on responses to Covid-19? | Nothing yet. |
| Q5. What novel approaches, if any, is your country using to address the coronavirus crisis (e.g. use of machine learning, open science initiatives boosting access and sharing of data and research results, development and use of prediction models, etc.)? | The country is using open science initiatives, boosting access and sharing of data and research results. - The collaborative platform “colabcr”, an open community of people from all over the country (from the public, private sectors, academia, and civil society), shares information, design, and science initiatives with the rest of the community as open science initiatives. https://covid19.presidencia.go.cr/mes-de... - The Ministry of Health in collaboration with the Universidad Estatal a Distancia (UNED) have a health Geographical Observatory that constantly shows the evolution of COVID-19 cases in Costa Rica. - The University of Costa Rica has created an interactive digital platform to view official update data from the Ministry of Health on COVID-19 at the national and cantonal levels. http://geovision.uned.ac.cr/oges/index.h... - A web application makes available to the public a history of confirmed and discarded cases since the start of the pandemic, which allows identifying the evolution of the virus over time. There is also a section where it is possible to visualize comparisons in the number of cases per canton. https://oddapp2.shinyapps.io/Coronavirus... |
| Q6A. What impact on the STI system do you anticipate in the short-, medium- and long-term, and what measures are you implementing to address those? | In the short term, the main impact is the ways research funds are used, because nowadays, most of these are addressing COVID-19 research. |
| Q6B. Is support of the STI system part of planned stimulus packages aimed at supporting the economy? | The STI system is planning to launch funds oriented to innovations for SMEs as a part of stimulus packages aimed at supporting the economy. |
| Q7. Is there anything else regarding the STI policy response to Covid-19 in your country you would like to mention? | [Left blank] |