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More on strengthening the NIH policy
Rick Weiss, Government Health Researchers Pressed to Share Data at No Charge, Washington Post, March 10, 2006. Excerpt:
Political momentum is growing for a change in federal policy that would require government-funded health researchers to make the results of their work freely available on the Internet. Advocates say taxpayers should not have to pay hundreds of dollars for subscriptions to scientific journals to see the results of research they already have paid for. Many journals charge $35 or more just to see one article -- a cost that can snowball as patients seek the latest information about their illnesses. Publishers have successfully fought the "public access" movement for years, saying the approach threatens their subscription base and would undercut their roles as peer reviewers and archivists of scientific knowledge. But the battle lines shifted last month when a National Institutes of Health report revealed that a compromise policy enacted last spring -- in which NIH-funded scientists were encouraged but not required to post their findings on the Internet -- has been a flop. Less than 4 percent filled out the online form to make their results available for public viewing. Update. Rick Weiss' story made it to the news blog of the Chronicle of Higher Education, where it will be seen by academics who missed it in the Post. |