Kluwer Press Release - For immediate distribution 7-30-03

[Ann Okerson <aokerson@pantheon.yale.edu>]

Date: Wed, 30 Jul 2003 10:10:48 -0400
From: Christian Alongi <Christian.Alongi@wkap.com>
To: "'ann.okerson@yale.edu'" <ann.okerson@yale.edu>
Subject: Kluwer Press Release - For immediate distribution 7-30-03
 
The following is a full-text version of this press release:
 
BM_290703Kluwer to Join Health InterNetwork Access to Research Initiative
(HINARI) Second Phase 

Dordrecht, NL - July 29, 2003 - Kluwer Academic Publishers announced its
participation in the second phase of the prestigious philanthropic project
Health InterNetwork Access to Research Initiative (HINARI). The initiative
itself is a major aspect of the work of the Health InterNetwork project
which was introduced by United Nations' Secretary-General Kofi Annan at
the UN Millennium Summit in the year 2000. The project aims to strengthen
public health services by providing public health workers, researchers and
policy makers access to high-quality, relevant and timely health
information through an Internet portal.

Launched in January 2003, the second phase of HINARI is underway. Many of
the world's leading scientific publishers are offering online access to
high-quality medical and related sciences journals for a symbolic price of
$1000 per year, beginning with a six-month free trial. All fees received
from institutions eligible for participation in this project will be
re-invested for on-site training.

Each publisher has been free to determine which countries and which
journals they include in HINARI. In the case of Kluwer Academic Publishers
this includes 140 state-of-the-art Medical journals covering a wide range
of multidisciplinary scientific research areas including Internal
Medicine, Cardiology, Surgery, Neurolosciences, Oncology, Clinical
Microbiology, Pathology, Obstetrics and Gynecology, Ophthalmology,
Biomedical Engineering, Genetics, Veterinary Medicine, Biochemistry,
Social Medicine and Health Care, Psychology, Behavioral Sciences and
Psychiatry from the imprints Kluwer Academic Publishers, Kluwer
Academic/Plenum Publishers, Kluwer Academic/Human Sciences Press, Kluwer
Academic/Consultants Bureau and Maik Nauka/Interperiodica.,/p>

The following countries have been elected by Kluwer Academic Publishers as
being eligible for the 'HINARI Second Phase': Algeria, Belize, Bolivia,
Colombia, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Federated States
of Micronesia, Fiji, Guatemala, Jamaica, Macedonia-TFYR, Marshall Islands,
Morocco, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Samoa (Western), Suriname, Tonga, Tunisia
and Wallis-and-Fortuna.

Kluwer is honored to work in close harmony with the World Health
Organization and our colleague STM publishers to further the worldwide
dissemination of scientific information, stated Peter Hendriks, President
Kluwer Academic Publishers. Doctors, nurses, researchers, librarians and
field staff will now have access to a wealth of imperative biomedical
information that the majority would never have been able to afford
otherwise. This is an enormous move forward to the security of World
Health and we are pleased to have our authors and contributors so well
represented in these developing countries.

The following countries have also been granted access to Kluwer's journals
within the framework of HINARI PHASE 1: Albania, Armenia, Burkina Faso,
Burundi, Cambodia, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Dem. Rep. of
the Congo, C�te d'Ivoire, Ethiopia, Gambia, Georgia, Ghana, Haiti,
Honduras, Kenya, Kiribati, Lao People's Dem. Rep., Madagascar, Malawi,
Mali, Mauritania, Republic of Moldavia, Mongolia, Mozambique, Nepal,
Nicaragua, Niger, Papua New Guinea, Rwanda, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Solomon
Islands, Somalia, Sudan, Tajikistan, Tanzania, Turkmenistan, Uganda,
Uzbekistan, Vietnam, Zambia and Zimbabwe.

About Kluwer Academic Publishers Kluwer Academic Publishers is a leading
publisher of scientific information, specializing in numerous fields
within Science, Technology, Medicine, Humanities and Social Sciences.
Located in Dordrecht, Boston, New York and London, Kluwer provides high
quality online products and services, journals and books, featuring
leading authors and researchers from around the world. For more
information on Kluwer, visit www.wkap.com <http://www.wkap.com/> .

Health InterNetwork The Health InterNetwork was created to bridge the
"digital divide" in health, ensuring that relevant information - and the
technologies to deliver it - are widely available and effectively used by
health personnel: professionals, researchers and scientists, and policy
makers. Launched by the Secretary General of the United Nations in
September 2000 and led by the World Health Organization, the Health
InterNetwork has brought together public and private partners under the
principle of ensuring equitable access to health information. The core
elements of the project are content, Internet connectivity and capacity
building.

As the first phase of making vital health content available, the Health
InterNetwork Access to Research Initiative (HINARI) provides a vast
library of the latest and best information on public health: more than
2,000 scientific publications, one of the world's largest collections of
biomedical literature. This collection is available through the efforts of
WHO together with the 6 biggest biomedical publishers: Blackwell, Elsevier
Science, the Harcourt Worldwide STM Group, Kluwer Academic Publishers,
Lippincott Williams and Wilkins, Springer Verlag and John Wiley. It has
been described by former WHO Director-General Dr Gro Harlem Brundtland as
"perhaps the biggest step ever taken towards reducing the health
information gap between rich and poor countries."

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