Principles of Transparency Checklist

1. The Name of journal
The Journal name, Population Medicine is unique and can not be confused with any of the other journals in the field.

2. Website
Our journal's web site has been developed with care so as to ensure high ethical and professional standards. Constant updating is performed to enhance website utility, ease navigation and maintain the information available as the most recent. The journal's website has the e-ISSN: 2654-1459.

3. Publishing schedule
The publishing schedule for this journal is continuous and grouped into monthly issues.

4. Archiving
To ensure digital preservation for the future, our electronic publications are archived with Portico. Portico is a third-party preservation service supported by both libraries and publishers to ensure that scholarly content published in electronic form will remain accessible for the long term.

5. Copyright
Copyright is clearly described on the journal's web site, and licensing terms are indicated on all published PDFs.
Authors submitting their work to Population Medicine retain the copyright of their work without restrictions.

6. Licensing
The default license for articles published in Population Medicine is the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0).
Authors who wish to publish their work under a commercial license are also able to choose between the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license (CC BY 4.0) or the Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License (CC BY-ND 4.0).

7. Publication ethics and related editorial policies
We have clear policies on handling potential conflicts of interest of editors, authors, and reviewers - all are requested to either complete ICMJE forms or declare no conflict of interest. The Authorship & COI tab provides further information.
The journal has policies on publication ethics that can be found via the following link.

8. Peer review process
All journal content is clearly marked as whether peer reviewed or not. Final article PDFs contain a description of the peer review process (internal or external) and provenance (commissioned or non commissioned) for that article. Peer review is double blind within our journal. Every original article is peer reviewed by a minimum of two external experts and one member of the editorial board. In all cases the manuscript is also reviewed by at one Editor-in-Chief. Letters to the Editor and Editorials are peer reviewed internally. All journal content is clearly marked as whether peer reviewed or not (internally vs. externally peer reviewed). All articles have a specific provenance and peer review tab (commissioned vs. non commissioned).
Authors may suggest external reviewers that are qualified to peer review the manuscript, provided that they have not collaborated closely in the near past and that they are not from the same institution. Authors may also note peer reviewers who they would not prefer to review this paper. While the authors suggestions are taken into account, the Editorial Office reserves the right to handle double blind peer review at its discretion. Any manuscripts received for review will be treated as confidential documents.
External peer reviewers are requested to report on the ethical aspects of the manuscript they are allocated to review and are requested to report also on the novelty, the impact, the statistical analysis, references and potential conflicts of interest. A specific peer review form is provided with closed and open based questions so as to rate the manuscript and provide comments.
Reviewers are also requested to consider the following, should they proceed with a review for the journal:

• According to COPE, reviewers are strictly suggested not to contact the authors directly without the permission of the journal.
• In case of active collaboration with the authors of a manuscript, reviewers are suggested to not proceed with a review as this raises concerns on potential conflict of interest and journal credibility may be at stake.
• Discrimination based on non-scientific criteria is clearly unacceptable (e.g. gender or nationality).

9. Access
Population Medicine is freely available to readers with no subscription or pay per view fees. The number of direct downloads for each article are noted next to the article's abstract.

10. Ownership and management
The journal is operated and managed by European Publishing. All content is published under the CC-BY-NC 4.0 international license, which means that the authors retain ownership of the content of their manuscript. Authors who wish to publish their work under a commercial license are also able to choose between the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license (CC BY 4.0) or the Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License (CC BY-ND 4.0).

11. Advisory body
Our journal has an editorial board whose members are recognized leading experts in all aspects of population, preventive and public health research including health care systems and health care delivery. The full names and affiliations of the journal's editors are provided from the Editorial Board page. The editorial board is the final governing body of the journal.

12. Editorial team/contact information
We provide the full names and affiliations of the journal's editors as well as full address and contact information for the editorial office and the publisher, under the Contact us tab.

13. Author fees
From September 2023 onwards an Article Processing Charge is being levied for all articles published in the journal, with the exception of those submitted from LIC. Detailed information on the amount of the APC can be found at the Instructions to Authors - How to submit page.
In addition, if a commercial license is applied (CC BY 4.0 or CC BY-ND 4.0), then a commercial license charge of 1000 E (plus VAT where applicable) is levied.

14. Other revenue
Population Medicine was supported through the application of Article Processing Charges, Commercial License charges, paper reprints and e-reprints. From 2019-2023, there were no Article Processing Charges or any related subscriptions or costs. Currently, revenue is obtained through the application of Article Processing Charges, paper reprints and e-reprints.
Manuscripts submitted after September 2023 have an Article Processing Charge, once accepted. APCs are levied to cover the cost of providing our quality publishing services. At the time of submission, for complete transparency regarding APCs, authors are mandated to accept the clearly written APCs or state that they have a waiver. Upon acceptance, a pro forma invoice is created, and upon publication, a final invoice is issued. APCs are payable within 30 days of the invoice date. From September 2023, articles that are accepted for publication carry an APC unless one of the below criteria apply:

• All manuscripts from Low-Income Countries are automatically granted a waiver.
• Manuscripts from Low Middle-Income Countries and from authors of High-Income Countries who are unable to pay the APC, are evaluated on a case by case basis by the Editor-in-Chief and the Publisher.
• Editorials and Letters to the Editor do not have any APCs

15. Advertising
The journal does not accept advertisements.

16. Direct marketing
We do not engage in direct solicitation of articles. To us, the best promotion of a journal is through the maintenance of high standards, quality manuscripts and vigorous double-blind peer review. In cases of very prominent researchers in the field, the journal does send one-to-one personal invitations for commissioned manuscripts or guest editorials. In this event, the manuscript/editorial will be noted as "commissioned" in the footnote of the PDF and in HTML format.

Repository policy
The journal's open access policy is registered under Sherpa Romeo, an online resource that aggregates and presents publisher and journal open access policies from around the world.