Big publishers cut access to journals in poor countries.

摘要

The world's main system for allowing free access to scientific journals in low-income countries seems to be falling apart as big publishers withdraw. At the beginning of 2011, researchers in Bangladesh, one of the world's poorest countries, received a letter announcing that four big publishers would no longer be allowing free access to their 2500 journals through the Health InterNetwork for Access to Research Initiative (HINARI) system. It emerged later that other countries are also affected. This is a major step backwards for science, health, and development in low-income countries, and we urge the publishers to reconsider. This development has also exposed how HINARI is a stopgap measure and how universal open access-to all journals in all countries-is the only long-term sustainable solution for access to scientific information in low-income and middle-income countries.