Healthy Skepticism Library item: 15714

Warning: This library includes all items relevant to health product marketing that we are aware of regardless of quality. Often we do not agree with all or part of the contents.

Publication type: Journal Article

Lenzer J.
US Congress introduces bill to end free access to federally funded research.
BMJ 2009 Jun 1; 338:b2199:
http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/extract/338/jun01_2/b2199?papetoc

Abstract:

A bill has been introduced in the US Congress that would end free access to the results of published studies funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

The HR 801 bill, entitled the Fair Copyright in Research Works Act, would, if passed, overturn a public access bill that was passed in October 2007 (BMJ 2007;335:906, doi:10.1136/bmj.39384.638241.DB). This requires researchers to deposit the results of studies with the National Library of Medicine for publication in PubMed Central within a year of publication in a peer reviewed journal. The current law only affects research funded by the National Institutes of Health.

The 2007 public access bill was supported by 26 Nobel prize winners, who signed a letter to Congress. Advocates of the bill said that patients and doctors would benefit from being able to access research findings in the PubMed database.

Elsevier, one of the big scientific publishers . . .