Tuesday, July 10, 2001

6 Publishers Will Give Poor Countries Free or Discounted Electronic Access to Journals By KATE GALBRAITH London Six of the world's leading medical journal publishers have announced plans to provide poor countries with free or low-cost electronic access to more than 1,000 medical and scientific journals. At least 600 institutions in developing countries -- principally universities, medical schools, nursing schools and research centers -- will benefit from the initiative, which will take effect in January. Each publisher will set its own terms, but access typically will become free in many of the world's 60 poorest countries, and heavily discounted in more than 30 low-income countries. Journal subscriptions tend to be expensive, sometimes exceeding $1,500 annually. "We have enormous potential for reducing the gap in access to health information in rich and poor countries," said Gro Harlem Brundtland, director-general of the World Health Organization, at a news conference here. The W.H.O. has pushed strongly for the effort, which follows international efforts to improve poor countries' access to western medications, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa. The six publishers are Blackwell, Elsevier Science, the Harcourt Worldwide STM Group, Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, Springer Verlag and John Wiley. Some also plan to make electronic textbooks available to developing countries under similar terms. For publishers, heavy investment in electronic media over the last few years has made differential pricing possible. "Total costs [of electronic publishing] don't come down, but what does come down is the marginal cost," said Derk Haank, chief executive of Elsevier Science, of electronic publishing. "It is only in the last two or three years that a commercial volume of medical research information has actually been available to the marketplace," said Jon Conibear, executive director of Blackwell Science. Concerns remain, however, that access to computer equipment and reliable Internet connections is problematic in many developing countries, something the W.H.O. says it plans to deal with. Absent from the initiative were several important American publications, including The Journal of the American Medical Association and The New England Journal of Medicine. The British Medical Journal, a leading biomedical publication, is already available online for free. Easy-to-print version E-mail this article

Public colleges are likely to maintain strong credit in face of cuts, Moody's says Education Management Corp. to merge with Argosy Education Group 8 new chief executives announced 6 publishers will give poor countries free or discounted electronic access to journals An online course in Britain draws 12,000 students