Brazilian Public Universities' Contributions to Global COVID-19 Research: Publications, International Collaboration, and Impact.

The Brazilian scientific community, primarily composed of public universities and research institutes, played a fundamental role in combating the COVID-19 pandemic. This study investigates Brazil's contribution to the global body of knowledge on COVID-19 through publications in scientific journals. Specifically, it analyzes bibliometric indicators of Brazilian scientific publications on COVID-19 between 2019 and 2023, as indexed in the Scopus database. The results demonstrate: 1) there was a global effort to understand the SARS-CoV-2 virus, resulting in significant scientific production; 2) the proportion of publications on the topic was higher in Brazil than in the rest of the world; 3) Brazilian research on COVID-19 covered several knowledge domains; 4) the proportion of joint publications by Brazilian and international scholars was higher on COVID-19 than on other topics; 5) Brazilian public universities responded to the challenge of COVID-19 research, engaging more with international collaboration networks and achieving a higher impact with their publications. The study highlights the importance of national scientific research in shaping public policies and in addressing global health crises. Despite political and funding challenges, the efforts of the Brazilian scientific community were remarkable, reinforcing the importance of sustained investment in science, technology, and innovation.