Peer review is complex, expensive and essential to maintaining the integrity of science. The central role of the peer review system is to filter out inaccurate information. Without that filter, it would be difficult to differentiate legitimate science from junk science, which would create risk and confusion among scientists, healthcare providers, patients and consumers.

Peer review involves the combined efforts of authors, editors, reviewers and publishers, and is financed entirely by publishers, who invest hundreds of millions of dollars in the process. Journals finance the peer review process through journal revenues. It is this business model that has been responsible for the development of the system of global scientific communication over hundreds of years, and it is this model that ensures its sustainability, integrity and independence. To read more about the peer review process and the role of publishers, click here.

Government mandates to take the manuscripts of published articles before the costs of peer review and publishing have been recovered, threaten the sustainability of scholarly publishing. If private sector publishers are unable invest in peer review and publishing, then who will? It is not a responsibility that government agencies have the expertise and resources to fulfill, today and in the future-nor should they.