The European Science Foundation’s (ESF) membership organisation for all medical research councils in Europe, the European Medical Research Councils (EMRC) has released an ESF-EMRC Science Policy Briefing (SPB) entitled ‘Open Access in Biomedical Research.’ The ESF-EMRC Science Policy Briefing highlights the need to accelerate the adoption of open access to research articles in the biomedical sciences across Europe.
Over the past few months, various reports and communications have been published on the topic of open access. These include the Finch Group report on June 18, 2012, the Publishing and the Ecology of European Research (PEER) final report on June 19, 2012, the European Research Council (ERC) announcement of its new open access policy on July 13, 2012, and the European Commission’s launch of a communication and recommendations to Member States ‘Towards better access to scientific information’ on July 17, 2012. On the same day, Science Europe reaffirmed its commitment to strengthening the European Research and recognised open access as a priority area in which a common policy and action plan will be developed and implemented.
The ESF-EMRC Science Policy Briefing was instigated to examine whether there are new opportunities for open access in biomedical research within Europe that will benefit European biomedical researchers and European society as a whole. The report provides three key recommendations for the adoption of open access policy.
The report proposes that research papers should be made freely available to all to read, use and re-use, with appropriate acknowledgement, in order to maximise the value of biomedical research, build on the body of knowledge, accelerate the process of discovery and improve human health. It calls on individual agencies to work together to raise awareness of the moral imperative for open access. Further, the report notes that all research stakeholders should work together in order to support the extension of Europe PubMed Central into a Europe-wide PubMed Central.
