Midtown Wednesdays

Open access to federally funded research -- growing momentum

Here's an update about open access to research from Ray English via Midtown Wednesdays host Rich Brhel, Director of Library at Myers University:

12/13/06. Today's Washington Post has a great story on the developing political momentum for changing US government policy to require government funded health researchers to make the results of their research openly
available in the Internet. The story describes recent developments that are moving in the direction of a change in the voluntary NIH policy -- a change that would make deposit in PubMed Central a requirement and mandate open access within six months of publication. The story also mentions two Senate bills. The first, which has been introduced by Senators Joe Lieberman (D-CT) and Thad Cochran (R-MS) is the American Center for CURES Act, which has a provision requiring open
access (within six months of publication in peer-review journals) to research sponsored by Health and Human Services Agencies (NIH, CDC, etc. ). The story also mentions a bill being considered by Senator John Cornyn (R-TX) that would require public access to government-funded research across a broad array of U.S. government agencies. Although the story doesn't mention it, Cornyn's bill is supposed to be introduced soon.

The title of the story is:
Government Health Researchers Pressed to Share Data at No Charge
and it's available here.

Note that access to the Post is free, but need to be registered first
before gaining access.

Ray English
Director of Libraries
Oberlin College

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posted by Unknown @ 3/13/2006