School of Law

Biography

Jacintha D. Toohey is a lecturer at the School of Law in Pietermaritzburg. She holds a LLM (Medical Law), LLB (UKZN). Jacintha is currently pursuing her Phd. She has over 16 years experience in externally-funded research grants/projects in academic environment. Jacintha has conducted research on the ethical-legal framework of (and contributed to the development of publications) adolescent sexual and reproductive health, child participation in health research and a review of the South Africa law/policy framework on adolescent access to HIV prevention interventions. Her research interests include the challenges in international health research partnerships and the development of research contracting policy, guidelines, and resource materials.

Academic Qualifications:

• LLB (UKZN)
• LLM, Medical Law (UKZN)

Other Professional Qualifications

• Online Certificate, E-learning Course: Introduction To Informed Consent, The Global Health Network
• Certificate, European Academy for Taxes, Economics & Law. The European Knowledge Network. Berlin, Germany: How to design research & development contracts in practice
• Certificate, Southern African Research & Innovation Management Association (SARIMA), National Intellectual Property Management Office (NIPMO), Durban, South Africa: Intellectual property workshop for researchers
• Diploma in Information Systems
• Diploma in Project Management

Research Interests

• Equity in International Research Partnerships
• Sexual and Reproductive Health Rights
• Bioethics
• Medical Law
• Research Ethics and Integrity

Recent Publications and Papers

• Strode, A., and Toohey, J., et al. (2013).Reporting underage consensual sex after the Teddy Bear case: A different perspective. South African Journal of Bioethics and Law, 6(2): 40-42.
• Strode, A., Richter, M., Wallace, M., Toohey, J., and Technau, K. (2014). Failing the vulnerable: Three new consent norms that will undermine health research with children. Southern African Journal of HIV Medicine, 15(2), 46-49.
• Strode, A. E., Toohey, J., Singh, P., and Slack, C. M. (2015). Boni mores and consent for child research in South Africa. South African Journal of Bioethics and Law, 8(1), 22-25.
• Musolino, N., Lazdins, J., Toohey, J., and IJsselmuiden, C. (2015). COHRED Fairness Index for international collaborative partnerships. The Lancet, 385(9975), 1293-1294.
• Essack, Z., Toohey, J., and Strode, A. (2016). Reflecting on adolescents’ evolving sexual and reproductive health rights: canvassing the opinion of social workers in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. Reproductive Health Matters, 24(47), 195-204.
• Strode, A., Toohey, J., and Slack, C. (2016). Addressing legal and policy barriers to male circumcision for adolescent boys in South Africa. South African Medical Journal, 106(12), 1173-1176.
• Doris Schroeder, et al. (2017) Global Code of Conduct for Research in Resource-Poor Settings. European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme, under funding agreement No. 664771. http://wp.globalcodeofconduct.org/about-the-code/ (Note: The Global Code is on the Participant Portal, which is officially the first code and first addition on the portal, produced by an European Union funded project – http://ec.europa.eu/research/participants/docs/h2020-fundingguide/cross-cutting-issues/ethics_en.htm ).
• Essack, Z., & Toohey, J. (2018). Unpacking the 2-year age-gap provision in relation to the decriminalisation of underage consensual sex in South Africa. South African Journal of Bioethics and Law, 11(2), 85-88.
• Kate Chatfield, Olivia Biernacki, Doris Schroeder, Francesca Cavallaro, Julie Cook, Dieynaba N’Diaye, Francois Bompart, Roger Chennells, Jacintha Toohey, Rachel Wynberg, Jaci van Niekirk, Myriam Ait Aissa. (2018). Research with, not about, communities – Ethical guidance towards empowerment in collaborative research, a report for the TRUST project. http://trust-project.eu/ .

Useful websites

• Health Law and Ethics Research Group: https://law.ukzn.ac.za/health-law/
• Research Fairness Initiative: http://rfi.cohred.org/
• Sharing Research Data to Improve Public Health in Africa: https://www.nap.edu/catalog/21801/sharing-research-data-to-improve-public-health-in-africa-a
• The TRUST Project: Creating and enhancing Trustworthy, responsible and equitable Partnerships in international Research: http://trust-project.eu/
• The TRUST Project: Creating and enhancing Trustworthy, responsible and equitable Partnerships in international Research: http://trust-project.eu/deliverables-and-tools/
• Global Code of Conduct for Research in Resource-Poor Settings: http://wp.globalcodeofconduct.org/about-the-code/
• Fair Research Contracting: http://frcweb.cohred.org/