From: Danny Jones <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2012 21:46:43 -0600
I recently retired and as a result signed off this list, but I am very
interested in seeing (specifically in my case) NIH-funded final
reports made publicly available. However, I recommend going a step
further to require the annual progress reports to be also made
publicly available along with data collected with federally funded
grants.
Before I retired on January 6, 2012 as director of the library at
Texas Biomedical Research Institute, I was responsible for monitoring
compliance with the NIH Public Access Policy by our mostly NIH-funded
investigators. TxBiomed scientists are generally supportive of the
policy, but it isn't always easy to be in compliance for a variety of
reasons. And complying represents an added regulatory burden for
investigators who often have moved on to other investigations when an
article finally gets published. NIH already requires funded
investigators to submit annual progress reports and final reports on
research that they fund. While I agree that the final reports should
be made publicly available, I think it is also important that the
progress reports should also be made publicly available.
NIH grants may require several years of work before a final report is
submitted, and during this time investigators may publish articles
reporting results of their funded investigations, which results will
also be included in their annual progress reports. Waiting for final
reports to be submitted to NIH may actually delay access to NIH-funded
research results, so both the annual progress reports and the final
report should be made publicly available.
As these reports are required by NIH already, it does not represent an
added burden to investigators (they are already doing it), and the
burden rests directly where it should be, with the funded
investigator. For as it is now with the NIH Public Access Policy,
final approval of manuscripts deposited into the NIH Manuscript
Submission System is the responsibility of the corresponding author,
who is not necessarily the NIH-funded author.
The NIH Public Access Policy should be repealed in my opinion. It is
an unnecessary added burden for NIH-funded authors and compliance is
not as simple as some suggest it is. And the punitive nature in which
investigators are required to comply by threat of consideration
against future funding from NIH does not result in great enthusiasm
for government regulations. The progress reports and the final
reports are already part of the established responsibility of
NIH-funded investigators, and making them publicly available will
provide the public with full information about the research that the
government is paying for.
While this approach does not address the contents of published journal
articles, having access to the investigators' reports of federally
funded research may in fact eliminate the need for access to journal
articles that acknowledge federally funded research grants. My chief
concern would be alert to and to resist efforts to minimize the
content of progress and annual reports.
Finally, not only should the reports be publicly available, but all
data generated as a result of federal funding should also be publicly
available.
Danny Jones
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