Open Access of Bio-Medical Literature: Need and Challenges

Most of the web based medical information is freely available, but barriers remain for access to research articles published in journals. Peer-review literature is often funded by govt./society/association which is extremely required to researchers, scientists and professionals. The scientists and clinicians provide free peer review services but journal access is controlled by the publishers who charge for subscription and even for a single article. There is an average annual increase of 4% to11% in the rate of each journal and with this effect; each research library is struggling to keep pace with increase. Due to inflation, huge portion of library budget is spent on the payment of journals. Merger of one publisher with other decreases the competition which leads to increase in the price of journals. To decrease the price rising trend, open access movement was started in the year 1998. Internationally open access publishers are Bio Med Central (BMC), Public Library of Science (PLoS) and other associations and societies. The prestigious international aggregator of journals which are providing open access are Pub Med Central (PMC), USA; Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ), Sweden and High wire Press, USA. Both the publishers (commercial and open access) are making counter attack on each other for their superiority.