Horizon of Public Health Sciences (HoPHS) is committed to maintaining an accurate, transparent, and trustworthy scholarly record. When material errors, integrity concerns, authorship disputes, or procedural complaints arise, the journal will take proportionate editorial action and preserve a clear public record of substantive post-publication changes.

HoPHS does not silently rewrite the scientific record when a substantive post-publication change is required. Material corrections, expressions of concern, and retractions will be documented through a clearly identified notice that cites and links to the affected article. Where technically feasible, the article record and PDF will also identify the existence and status of the notice.

Differences in interpretation, legitimate methodological debate, evolving evidence, or subsequent scientific developments do not by themselves require correction or retraction. Where appropriate, these issues may be addressed through correspondence, commentary, subsequent research, or another transparent scholarly mechanism.

In exceptional cases, an honest error may substantially change the reported results, interpretation, or conclusions while the underlying research remains scientifically valid. HoPHS may consider retraction with republication when a fully corrected manuscript undergoes appropriate additional editorial and peer-review scrutiny.

An Expression of Concern may be issued when substantial questions have been raised about a published article but the available evidence is insufficient to justify correction or retraction, or when an investigation is ongoing and readers should be alerted while a definitive outcome is pending.

An Expression of Concern is not a finding of misconduct. It is an interim or cautionary notice that will be updated, replaced, or resolved when sufficient evidence becomes available.

Retraction is normally preferred to deletion because the publication history should remain visible. Complete removal of article content will be considered only in exceptional circumstances, such as a binding legal requirement, serious privacy or confidentiality breach, unlawful content, or a substantial and immediate risk that cannot be addressed through ordinary correction or retraction. Where possible, the bibliographic record and an explanatory notice will remain accessible.

Requests to add, remove, reorder, or otherwise change authorship must be accompanied by a clear explanation. HoPHS may require written agreement from all affected authors and revised contributor declarations.

If a complaint concerns the handling editor, it should be considered by another appropriate editor. If the complaint concerns the Editor-in-Chief, presents an institutional conflict, or cannot be handled impartially within the editorial team, the matter will be escalated to an appropriate independent senior authority acting on behalf of the journal's publisher.

Allegations involving fabrication, falsification, plagiarism, duplicate publication, unethical research, manipulation of peer review, undisclosed material conflicts, image manipulation, or other research-integrity concerns are assessed under the HoPHS Publication Ethics & Research Integrity Policy. A complaint or appeal process does not prevent the journal from initiating or continuing an integrity investigation.

HoPHS will seek relevant evidence, provide affected parties an appropriate opportunity to respond, manage conflicts of interest, and distinguish honest error from misconduct where the available evidence permits. The journal may seek advice from reviewers, statistical or methodological experts, ethics bodies, institutions, funders, publishers, or other competent authorities when needed.

HoPHS aims to preserve the scholarly record rather than obscure it. Corrections, expressions of concern, retractions, authorship amendments, complaints, and appeals will be handled with transparency, proportionality, appropriate independence, and respect for due process.