Corporate report

UKHSA Advisory Board: Annual Science Review

Updated 25 November 2024

Title of paper: Progress with implementation of UKHSA’s Science Strategy and publication of its first Science Review

Date: 19 November 2024

Sponsor: Isabel Oliver

1. Purpose of the paper

We have a near-final extended draft of UKHSA’s Science Review which we plan to publish shortly. This document has been discussed at the Science and Research Committee and comments from Non-Executive Members are being included.

2. Recommendations

The Advisory Board is asked to:

• note this forthcoming publication
• comment on the draft Science Review

3. Background

The Science Review will be the first public report on the impact of UKHSA’s scientific functions and progress with implementation of the Science Strategy that was launched in 2023. Predecessor bodies have not produced this type of review, but we have reviewed annual scientific reports from several public sector research establishments in other sectors.

Following discussions at various meetings, the primary audience for the interested reader such as Chief Scientific Advisors, officials in other parts of government, science partners in industry, academia and other Public Sector Research Establishments (PSREs) and research funders. It will also be of interest to colleagues within UKHSA and across the public health system. In terms of wider audiences, the Communications Directorate are working alongside the team producing the document to identify how the content can be used for specific news and communications features are part of a 12-month communications plan. 

The purpose, structure and content has been discussed by the Science and Research Committee of the Board, and by the Executive Committee and the Science Futures and Research Governance Committee on several occasions and comments, including from Advisory Board members, have been built into the work on the document.

4. Implementation of the Science Strategy

The Science Review will provide a report on progress with implementing the Science Strategy. This draws on the internal quarterly reporting system that supplements the reporting of specific elements of the Strategy into the corporate portfolio and performance report.

The progress being reported in the Science Review includes:

• establishment and development of the Centre for Climate and Health Security
• establishment and development of the Vaccine Development and Evaluation Centre
• the Pathogen Genomics programme and publication of our pathogen genomics strategy
• the Data Strategy that is important for our academic and industry partnerships as well as to improve our internal robustness and resilience
• the strengthening and expansion of our scientific partnerships with industry, academia and other parts of government, including the UK Research and Innovation Virus Research Institutes and our work with Moderna and AstraZeneca
• our global work, especially with the global South including on disaster risk reduction, the New Variant Evaluation Programme, and the World Health Organization Collaborating Centres
• the establishment of the Talent for Science workforce programme and progress made to improve staff recruitment, retention and development

5. Impact of our science

The ambition set out in the science strategy is to secure better health outcomes and greater prosperity through our science. The Annual Review of Science considers the impact that our science has had since its publication. To assess this, we have done work on how we can show that our science is impactful. This has two main elements but further work is planned.

Firstly we have developed a framework to analyse and present the impact of our science. We have created a Theory of Change for impact that develops the three domains of impact (see table below) and creates a pathway to impact of three stages (planning; delivering outputs that will lead to impact; and actual impact that can be shown following competition).

Health	Prosperity	Scientific advancement
Health outcomes and impact through contribution to the delivery of strategic priorities including impact on reducing inequalities. Contribution of UKHSA scientific evidence and advice on policy development and implementation	Of UKHSA: Generation of external income. Of UK: Directly through contribution to life science adding value to industry and academia. Indirectly through reducing NHS and social care burden and preventing costs	Our contribution as measured by quality and quantity of scientific outputs

Secondly we have run a call for impact case studies from across UKHSA and reviewed these. 52 case studies were submitted and went through an in-house triage prior to going to a panel of internal and external experts, chaired by Professor Graham Hart, NEM of UKHSA. The panel recommended some of the case studies for inclusion in the Annual Review of Science, others for general publication on the Central Research Information System (CRIS) section of the UKHSA website while the rest will be available internally.

Case studies were asked to identify their impact using the three domains. We have included information about our impact on wider science and prosperity through research grants, publications and income generating activities and covered the following:

• the diversity and depth of our research and evidence work. We undertake basic and applied research, data-based analysis, epidemiological and other evaluations, support clinical trials and animal research. This has produced 735 publications, 90% of which are open access, and range of academic collaborations, with 500 universities globally, including the Health Protection Research Units

• the central role of science in identifying and responding to threats to the public’s health, including chemical, radiation and nuclear threats, anti-microbial resistance, blood-borne infections, vector-borne diseases and new and emerging pathogens, including mpox

• a focus on reducing health inequalities, including work on vaccines; child health, including lead and air pollution, and indoor air quality and damp/mould; and prison health

6. Remaining work

There have been challenges in producing the Science Review. The draft report is being finished, including the:

• length: the breadth of UKHSA’s science and the diversity of activities that we undertake mean that the draft report is lengthy. This is partly because the purpose of the document is to demonstrate the range of our work. Also we have sought to address areas of external interest including those in relation to government priorities
• impact: we have done valuable work to develop arrangements to assess the impact of our scientific activities, however further work is needed to capture and communicate the impact of our work
• case studies that show the difference we have made: although we had an excellent response to the call for impact case studies, the panel concluded that, overall, they described how the science could impact and showed the potential for impact, rather the describing impact that had taken place and could be measured. We are working on making the case studies that have been selected for the report have clear evidence of impact.
• metrics: across UKHSA, we tend to have limited data on our scientific outputs and outcomes/impact, though we have detailed data on inputs and processes, which are well covered in the agency’s Annual Report. Available facts and figures are being included in the draft report and further work will be done to strengthen this going forwards.

7. Conclusion

Publication of the Science Review will be an important milestone in raising the profile and evidencing the value of UKHSA’s scientific capabilities and functions. Good progress has been made towards the ambitions in the strategy and work is underway to develop a programme of work to grow our science and its impact. Measuring impact has been challenging but a framework for assessing the impact of our work has been developed to strengthen future reports.

Richard Gleave

Director of Science Strategy and Development