WHO launches online medical library

The World Health Organization (WHO) and six of the world's largest publishers of medical journals on Thursday launched a project to enable medical experts in developing countries to gain access, via the Internet, to medical literature which they could previously obtain only by paying high subscription fees. The 'Health InterNetwork Access to Research Initiative' will allow thousands of doctors, researchers, health policy-makers and others to have access for free or at significantly reduced charges to "one of the world's largest collections of biomedical literature", WHO said in a news release on Thursday. During the project's first stage, more than 1,000 journals will be available to people in 70 countries. The project's second stage will target other developing countries. The online project, which is expected to run for an initial three-year period, is part of a larger initiative, the Health InterNetwork project, which aims to strengthen public health services by giving specialists access to relevant and reliable medical information. Information will come from journals published by Blackwell, Elsevier Science, the Harcourt Worldwide STM Group, Wolters Kluwer International Health & Science, Springer Verlag and John Wiley. WHO Director-General Gro Harlem described 'Access to Research' as a big step towards "reducing the information gap between rich and poor countries". The address of the Health InterNetwork Access to Research Initiative website is www.healthinternetwork.net