Access to databases that contain influenza sequences is vital for scientists doing research and developing vaccines. Open access means scientists can deposit and retrieve this information in a timely manner. GenBank, maintained by the National Center for Biotechnology Information, a part of the National Library of Medicine, National Institutes of Health (U.S.), is one example of a publicly accessible database used by many scientists from around the world.
However, other organizations, agencies and labs in the U.S. and other countries hoard sequence data and either do not share it at all, share it by password-only to a select few, or do not release data in a timely manner. The World Health Organization (WHO) and the U.S. Center for Disease Control (CDC) are some examples of groups who are withholding sequence data.
As we face a possible influenza pandemic, ethical scientists from around the world are calling for a new paradigm: open access to all influenza sequence data from organizations, agencies, and labs, regardless of the country of origin.
The page also includes a good collection of quotations from major flu scientists calling for OA to flu data.
PS: For background, see my April article on OA to avian flu data.
Posted by
Peter Suber at 6/25/2006 10:00:00 AM.
The open access movement:
Putting peer-reviewed scientific and scholarly literature
on the internet. Making it available free of charge and
free of most copyright and licensing restrictions.
Removing the barriers to serious research.
I recommend the OA tracking project (OATP) as the best way to stay on top of new OA developments. You can read the OATP feed on a blog-like web page or subscribe to it by RSS, email, or Twitter. You can also help build the feed by tagging new developments you encounter.
