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Article History

Received: 24 April 2025

Accepted: 19 March 2026

First Online: 26 March 2026

Declarations

:

: The WHO-PEN@Scale study was approved by the Institutional Review Boards at the University of Heidelberg, the University of Eswatini, and the EHHRRB. In the household survey participants were informed that participation is fully voluntary, and refusal to participate or discontinuation in the survey will not have any influence on any aspect of their lives. Further details regarding the ethical approval of the study are detailed in the protocol paper (5).

: Not applicable.

: All participants were given a study-specific identifier. No identifying information werereported on study forms apart from the consent form. The link between identifiers and participant’s names were held by a designated person at the CHAI who was not involved directly in data analysis. Field staff did not have access to data after collection. Data collection procedures were conducted at participants’ homes on encrypted mobile tablet computers using the KOBO Toolbox platform. Questionnaires were locked once validated and finalized by the research managers in the field, so that they could not be re-opened in the field. At this point, data forms were encrypted using asymmetric public key encryption. Once collected, data was transferred to a secure server located at CHAI. This server is located in a locked room. In order to export data from the server, an asymmetric private key is used.

: The authors declare no competing interests.