A new expanded scope from PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases

This post was written by Kendall McKenzie, Managing Editor PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases

PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases is delighted to share that we have expanded our scope!

We widened the journal scope after several months of conversations with our expert editorial board members and community members, so it is accurate to say that this was truly a communal effort to benefit neglected populations of the world through research. 

There are several pertinent additions, and some of the diseases previously considered “on the cusp” are now included. We hope you will read through the new scope page to see what has changed, but most notably, we are now accepting papers on: envenomings caused by arthropods in addition to snakes; more types of mycosis fungal infections; rickettsioses; Hepatitis C and E; Rheumatic Heart Disease; and ONE health approaches in vulnerable or neglected populations. 

To help us celebrate this milestone in the journal’s history, we asked some of the community members who were involved in these conversations to share their thoughts on the importance of these inclusions: 

“The expansion of the scope of PLOS NTDs to include envenomings caused by scorpions and other groups of animals, in addition to snakes, provides the opportunity to grasp the complexity of the landscape of these envenomings, paving the way for a more comprehensive understanding of the similarities and differences that lie behind these diseases, and fostering common paths for interventions aimed at reducing their impact.” 

-Dr. José María Gutiérrez, Deputy Editor

“The Rickettsiales includes a number of really important human pathogens, but these are often overlooked by clinicians and researchers alike. The formal inclusion of these organisms in the newly expanded PLOS NTDs scope will hopefully encourage submissions by authors in the field and help to raise the profile of these important but neglected bacteria.” 

-Dr. Jeanne Salje, Deputy Editor

The Editors-in-Chief, Drs. Shaden Kamhawi and Paul Brindley, are delighted for these inclusions to be made public: 

“Since its inception, PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases has been dedicated to publishing studies of the neglected diseases that prevail among poor communities, striving to promote awareness of the unequitable disease burden and suffering that these conditions impose, and through increase in scientific knowledge and awareness, to redress and improve the health and prosperity of these communities. To ensure we are sustaining our goals as well as evolving amid a changing climate and environment, we are expanding our scope to include arthropod envenoming, rickettsioses, an expanded focus of mycoses, and Noma, among others, brought to our attention by experts in the field who cogently advocated to expand the journal’s breadth of disease coverage for these neglected diseases. Moreover, the journal must continue to evolve and adapt to new challenges, with the SARS-Cov2 pandemic sadly being the chiché-ed example of why that is necessary.” 

We are excited to receive submissions in the new areas, now part of our expanded scope, and ask that if you or someone you know has expertise in one of these fields, and are interested in joining our editorial board, please email us to let us know (plosntds@plos.org).

Our new mission statement reads: “PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases is dedicated to research that addresses the neglected, the forgotten, and the under-resourced, in order to improve the health and prosperity of all the world’s people. We work alongside researchers spanning every continent who are deeply rooted in under-resourced communities.” We want to reiterate that the PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases scope is an ever-changing conversation with our community. If an aspect of research for neglected populations isn’t being represented, we encourage our community to reach out to us and discuss it (plosntds@plos.org). 

Featured image by David Todd McCarty on Unsplash