An image of the SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. Image: National Institutes of Health/AFP via AFP Relaxnews
WASHINGTON — Science policy leaders from around the globe are calling on publishers to immediately make available all research and data on the new coronavirus.
The leaders come from a dozen countries, including the United States, Italy, Japan and South Korea. They are asking in a letter addressed to members of the scholarly publishing community to make coronavirus research available in the PubMed Central repository and the World Health Organization’s COVID data base.
Kelvin Droegemeier, director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, helped lead the effort. The science advisers said a prompt response from the scientific and publishing committee will accelerate global efforts to contain the virus “and thus save lives.”
They want the information to be in human and machine-readable format to allow for text and data mining using artificial intelligence.