Reproducibility of COVID-19 pre-prints

Abstract

To examine the reproducibility of COVID-19 research, we create a dataset of pre-prints posted to arXiv, bioRxiv, and medRxiv between 28 January 2020 and 30 June 2021 that are related to COVID-19. We extract the text from these pre-prints and parse them looking for keyword markers signaling the availability of the data and code underpinning the pre-print. For the pre-prints that are in our sample, we are unable to find markers of either open data or open code for 75 per cent of those on arXiv, 67 per cent of those on bioRxiv, and 79 per cent of those on medRxiv.