Of what use is research, particularly when it is funded by the government, if the results published in peer-reviewed journals are not freely accessible to the scientific community? Since many journals allow access to published papers only on subscription, researchers, especially those in developing countries, find themselves at a disadvantage. The National Institutes of Health (NIH), the United States' federal agency for conducting and supporting research, has now corrected the anomaly. The Consolidated Appropriations Act passed recently makes it mandatory for researchers funded by the NIH after April 7, 2008, to submit their final peer-reviewed manuscripts upon acceptance for publication to the agency's PubMed Central online repository for free access not later than one year after the official date of publication. The scientific community is bound to greatly benefit as nearly 80,000 publications arise from NIH-funded projects every year. Yet, allowing for an embargo of up to a year is not healthy, particularly in the field of medicine. By making it mandatory to submit the manuscript even before its publication, the new policy has ensured that free access will be possible immediately after the expiry of the embargo date. Its initial move in 2005 to make free access possible failed as investigators were under no compulsion to comply. Though several open access peer-reviewed journals have come into being, they are not the first choice for paper submission since they do not enjoy the same standing as the established journals.
Though subscription is a source of revenue for journals, the
apprehension that free online access would hurt their bottomline is
misplaced; the Act is applicable only to papers arising from
NIH-funding. In fact, a number of publishers have already agreed to
make published articles available to PubMed Central directly. It is
commendable that the NIH did not allow commercial interests of
publishers to override the merits of free dissemination of information
as an essential requirement for scientific advance. The NIH has
resolved the contentious issue of copyrights that was dogging free
access. By making the authors responsible for working out a copyrights
transfer agreement with the publishers that allows them to comply with
the policy, it has ensured greater compliance. And by spelling out
clearly that compliance with the policy is a "statutory requirement"
and that non-compliance will delay or prevent future grants, the policy
has ensured that open access becomes a reality at last.