A paper was submitted to journal A with a covering letter stating that it was entirely original. However, when the editor looked at the references he found considerable overlap with a paper already published in journal B about the same infection outbreak, but with a completely different set of authors bar one. A comparison of the papers showed that there was considerable overlap. When challenged, the authors of the journal A paper defended themselves by saying that their study describes the clinical aspects whereas the paper in journal B describes epidemiology and control.They also state that they were completely transparent about the existence of the earlier paper in journal B. There are several points which concern the editor: There are inconsistencies between the two papers. The authors did not send a copy of the paper from journal B with their submission to journal A and the covering letter stated that the work was original It is not clear that this particular infection outbreak had been described before. Admittedly, there is some expanded clinical information in the paper for journal A and the authors did refer to the microbiology and epidemiology being described in a previous paper in journal B. The journal B paper contains a lot of clinical material and it is surprising that only one of the authors is on both papers.
Arguments about the degree of overlap might never be resolved. The editor should seek independent assessment of the degree of overlap. Real key here is the degree of disclosure/transparency about the existence of the earlier paper. If the authors were explicit about this,then there is no problem. COPE would like to hear the editor’s assessment of the degree of transparency.
The case was investigated by the chief executive of whom? The overlap was evident on re-review, but the chief executive felt that there had been no deliberate intention to deceive.