[mla-nynj] FW: ACTION: NIH Public Access Policy

[Reich, Barbara]

Forwarding for Mahnaz Tehrani, who is having email problems.

 

Barbara S. Reich, MLS, AHIP, NAF

Director, Medical Library

Samuel and Sandra Hekemian Medical Library

Hackensack University Medical Center

30 Prospect Avenue

Hackensack NJ 07601

 

voice: 201-996-2326

fax: 201-996-2467

email: breich at humed.com 

 

-----Original Message-----



 

Dear GRC and Legislative Task Force members-

There have been two amendments added to the FY 2008 Labor-HHS-Education
Appropriations bill, #3416 and #3417, that the Senate will consider on
Monday, October 22 or Tuesday, October 23..  The first, #3416,
introduced by Sen. Inhofe (R-OK), strips the provision from the
Appropriations bill that would direct the NIH to implement a mandatory
policy ensuring the free, timely access to all research articles
stemming from NIH funded research via NIH's PubMed Central online
archive thus maintaining the current voluntary policy. The second,
#3417, modifies the provisions to maintain the NIH voluntary research
public access policy but include the language.."only where allowed by
and in accordance with the policies of the publishers who have conducted
the peer review and accepted the manuscripts for publication".
We were just alerted to both amendments about 5:00 p.m. CT today and do
not have the Senator who introduced amendment #3417.  We particularly
want to reach Harry Reid (D-NV) and Mitch McConnell (R-KY) about our
oppositions to these amendments so if you know medical librarians from
these states, please be sure that they receive this message.  Mary
Langman from MLA HQ and Dane Christiansen from the Health & Medicine
Council in DC will be talking about this more on Monday and send other
updates as needed.

Please call or fax letters to your Senators before noon Monday(October
22) asking that they vote NO on both amendments.  

Fax numbers for members of the Senate are available at
http://www.capwiz.com/ala/issues/alert/?alertid=10301446. The Capitol
switchboard number is 202-224-3121. 

        Key Points:

        . Oppose the amendments which would strike the NIH Public Access
provision in the Labor-HHS-Education Appropriations bill. 

        . Support language in the FY'08 Labor-HHS-Education
Appropriations bill to require NIH grantees to deposit in PubMed Central
final peer-reviewed manuscripts no later than 12 months following
publication in a peer-reviewed journal.

        . This change in policy, that it be a requirement to deposit
federally funded research at the NIH, has the full support of the NIH
Director, as well as broad bipartisan support in Congress.  AAU has also
endorsed this change in policy.

        . Public access to federally funded research speeds the pace of
discovery by expanding access to research findings - something the
voluntary policy has failed to do.

        . Enhanced public access also significantly improves NIH's
accountability both internally and with Congress by making it much
simpler to track NIH investments and corresponding results.

        . With a deposit rate of less than 5%, the NIH's current
voluntary policy has failed to achieve the policy's stated goals since
its implementation in 2005.  A mandate to deposit federally funded
research is needed to ensure compliance and to achieve NIH's mission
driven polices -- supporting accountability, archiving federally funded
research and enhancing public access.

Thank you for any help that you can give on this very important issue.

Sincerely,

Carla
 
Carla J. Funk, MLS, MBA, CAE
Executive Director
Medical Library Association
65 East Wacker Place
Suite 1900
Chicago, Illinois 60601-726
ph  312/419-9094, ext. 14
fax 312/419-8950
funk at mlahq.org
www.mlanet.org <http://www.mlanet.org/>  

Please attend MLA '08 "Connections: Bridging the Gaps" in Chicago, IL,
May 16-21, 2008!!!

 
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