Environmental health perspectives, widely considered the premier Environmental Health Journal, has announced that it would stop accepting new studies for publication, since federal cuts have left their uncertain future.
For more than 50 years, the magazine has received funds from the National Health Institutes to review studies on the health effects of environmental toxins, from “Forever Chemicals” to air pollution, and publish the research for free.
The publishers made the decision to stop the acceptance of the studies due to a “lack of confidence” that the contracts of critical expenses such as copies edition and the Wolde editorial software will be renewed after their imminent expiration dates, said Joel Kaufman, the upper part of the magazine.
He declined to comment on future publications.
“If the newspaper is lost, it is a great loss,” said Jonathan Levy, President of the Environmental Health Department of the University of Boston. “It is reducing people’s ability to have good information that can be used to make good decisions.”
The Nejm editor described the letter as “vaguely threatening.” On Tuesday, the magazine Obstetrics and Ginecology, published by the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, said he had received that letter.
Scientific journals have long been the objective of senior health officials in the Trump administration.
In a book published last year, Dr. Martin A. Makary, the new Commissioner of the Food and Medicines Administration, accused the editorial boards of the “Gate-Keeping” magazine and publishing only information that supports a “narrative of group thought.”
In an interview with the Podcast “Dr. Hyman Show” last year, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who is now Secretary of Health and Human Services, said he planned to process medical magazines under federal anti -corruption laws.
“I will find a way of jumping, you can think of a plan at this time to show how you are going to start publishing real sciences,” he said.
Even so, the announcement about EHP’s bewildered researchers, who pointed out that fund cuts seemed to conflict with the declared priorities of the Trump administration.
For example, Mr. Kennedy has repeatedly emphasized the importance of studying the role of the environment in the cause of chronic diseases. The new administration has also expressed interest in the transparency and public accessibility of scientific journals, an area in which EHP has Bone to Trail Blazer.
EHP was one of the first “open access” magazines, which allowed anyone to read without subscription. And unlike many other open access magazines, which charge the researchers thousands of dollars to publish their work, the federal support of EHPS The stresses of smaller universities could publish without worrying about a rate.
“There are multiple layers of irony here,” said Dr. Levy.
EHP is not the only magazine trapped in the crossfire of fund cuts in the Department of Health and Human Services.
A budget for the department, Obolic by the New York Times, proposes to eliminate two magazines published by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention: Emerging Infectious Diseases and Prevention of Chronic Diseases. Both are published for free for authors and readers and are among the main magazines in their fields.
Andrew Nixon, an HHS spokesman, said that “a final decision has not been made” about the next budget.
Emerging infectious diseases, published monthly, provide avant -garde reports on threats of infectious diseases around the world.
He has helped shape the preparation and response to the outbreaks, said Jason Kindrachuk, a virologist at the University of Manitoba who has published research on Marburg and Mpox viruses in the magazine.
The news “is very discouraging,” he said.
