Reply to letter to the editor “Lessons from COVID-19 to future evidence synthesis efforts: first living search strategy and out of date scientific publishing and indexing industry”

Ignoring Chinese language publications for any evidence synthesis during the early phase of the outbreak would have meant ignoring the bulk of the evidence. From 29 included studies, six were published in the Chinese language and listed in Chinese literature databases [4]. Because COVID-19 has become a rapidly evolving pandemic, future rapid reviews should also include languages of countries that have become heavily affected in the meantime (e.g., Italian or Spanish). [...]as the scientific literature on COVID-19 matures over time, focusing on English-language publications will once again capture the most important findings on this topic in the future.