SSPH+ Journals

The SSPH+ journals Public Health Reviews (PHR) and the International Journal of Public Health (IJPH) saw continued success in 2023. We were delighted to receive PHR’s first impact factor of 5.5, whilst IJPH also received a strong impact factor of 4.6. In total, 1’300 manuscripts were submitted across the two journals, an increase on last year’s total of 931, and 314 manuscripts were published.

The journals hosted five new special issue calls during 2023. Indeed, special issue calls remain a key strategic tool for our journals, and in December 2023 a group of editors from both journals published an editorial explaining their importance. We also saw increased collaboration between IJPH and PHR in 2023. The journals ran their first joint special issue, which has attracted much interest. We look forward to more collaboration of this type between the journals in the future. We also ran the first ever joint Editorial Board Meeting between the journals at Swiss TPH in Allschwil in October 2023. This event also provided an opportunity to say farewell to the journals’ long-serving Managing Editor Anke Berger, and to welcome Christopher Woodrow to the role.

The journals continue to rely on their dedicated team of over 80 editors from around the world. As planned, 2023 saw the launch of the editors’ credit system to honour the efforts made during the pandemic. The Young Researcher Editorials (YRE) training program also welcomed a new Editorial Board and has continued to be productive, with eight YRE editorials published during the year 2023.

Finally, the journals’ two APC programs have been a great success. Fifteen author teams benefitted from the “APC Waiver Program for SSPH+ Affiliates” during 2023, and SSPH+ have decided to prolong this initiative to cover manuscripts submitted until the end of 2024. Our GLOBEQUITY program for LMIC+ first authors, supported by the Open Science Program of swissuniversities, funded APCs for 36 manuscripts during 2023. The level of funding provided by swissuniversities has been expanded until the end of the program in September 2024, and we plan to run a large-scale survey to investigate the impact of the waivers in the coming year.