We explore conceptions of responsibility and integrity in global health research and practice as it is being carried out in the academic setting. Our specific motivation derives from the recent publication of a study by a clinical research team involving the delivery of mental health care services in a Ghanaian prayer camp. The study was controversial on account of the prayer camp's history of human rights abuses and therefore was met with several high-profile critiques. We offer a more charitable evaluation of the Joining Forces study. Our analysis has three primary goals. First, we respond to criticism suggesting that the Joining Forces research team needed to maintain some form of morally "clean hands" in relation to the human rights abuses at Mount Horeb prayer camp. We argue that, for academic global health practitioners working under severe resource constraints, what is reasonable and responsible to pursue is a complex proposition without a one-size-fits-all ethical answer. Second, we offer an explanation for why the Joining Forces study team designed the project as they did in spite of their obvious vulnerability to ethical concern. We argue that the Joining Forces study was a morally risky, but ethically earnest effort to reach a neglected patient population and promote behavior change in prayer camp staff. Third, we identify an open ethical question born of the researchers' commitment to pragmatism that, to our knowledge, has not been previously addressed in published discussion of the Joining Forces project. Namely, was the incomplete disclosure of information to prayer camp staff defensible? We close with a broader reflection on the notion of moral integrity in the pursuit of the salutary aims of global health.

中文翻译：

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全球健康的研究和责任：对加纳联合力量研究的分析。

我们探索全球健康研究和实践中的责任和诚信概念，因为它正在学术环境中进行。我们的具体动机源于临床研究团队最近发表的一项研究，该研究涉及在加纳祈祷营地提供精神卫生保健服务。由于祈祷营有侵犯人权的历史，这项研究引起了争议，因此遭到了一些备受瞩目的批评。我们对联合力量研究提供了更慈善的评估。我们的分析有三个主要目标。首先，我们回应批评，认为联合力量研究团队需要在与何烈山祈祷营地侵犯人权有关的道德上保持某种形式的“干净的手”。我们认为，对于在资源严重受限的情况下工作的学术型全球卫生从业者而言，合理且负责任的追求是一个复杂的命题，没有一刀切的道德答案。其次，我们解释了为什么联合力量研究团队设计这个项目，尽管他们明显容易受到伦理问题的影响。我们认为，Joining Forces 研究在道德上有风险，但在道德上是认真的，旨在接触被忽视的患者群体并促进祈祷营工作人员的行为改变。第三，我们确定了一个开放的伦理问题，该问题源于研究人员对实用主义的承诺，据我们所知，以前在联合力量项目的已发表讨论中没有解决过这个问题。即，不完整地向祈祷营工作人员披露信息是否合理？最后，我们对追求全球健康有益目标的道德操守概念进行了更广泛的反思。