Table 1.

Characteristics of studies included in the review

Study name	Article description	Methodology	Challenges	Recommendations
[4]	Mapping COVID-19 research	Literature review	Low methodological quality and poor reporting of trials	The need to improve methodology and reporting of studies by having a robust peer review process
(Alper, Richardson, Lehmann, & Subbian) 2020	Covid 19-Knowledge accelerator initiative	Commentary	Inefficiencies across multiple steps in generating evidence	The need to have computable evidence
[6]	Analysis of COVID-19 research across science and Social Science Research Landscape	Research study	High output of research data addressing COVID 19 pandemic and lack of collaboration between researchers from different disciplines	the need for a complete and in-depth approach that considers various scientific disciplines in COVID-19 research to benefit not only the scientific community but evidence-based policymaking.
(Bell) 2021	Evidence synthesis and COVID	Editorial	Outdated reviews Review process is laborious and slow to complete as new evidence is being added.	The need to have weekly reviews conducted to ensure the currency of the evidence. The need to prioritise topics for updating of the evidence
[9]	Investigation of the presence of publication bias in COVID-19 studies	Research study	Reporting of only positive studies	Pre-registration of studies and public sharing of data for all study types Meta analysis of observational studies should also be undertaken
(Biesty et al.) 2020	Investigation of qualitative synthesis methodologies to respond to COVID-19 Pandemic	Discussion paper	Potential criticism about rapid review Concerns about the generalisation of the qualitative evidence Time limitation	The need to produce a Rapid qualitative approach for the Cochrane collaboration to guide decisions based on worked examples and case studies