The Role of Libraries and LIS Professionals in Changing the Open Access Landscape during COVID-19 Crisis

Abstract

The COVID-19 has made us realize the importance of “R4: information must reach the ‘right information’ ‘in right time’ ‘to right person’ and ‘through a right channel or platforms’ and eventually witnessed to the era of ‘teach for all’ ‘learn by all’ ‘learn without a wall, without teacher’ ‘service on finger’ and ‘information on devices.’ The unexpected outbreak of COVID-19 infections in 2020 has a global impact without any man-women, aged-child, color, rich-poor, literate-illiterate, and other geographical and ethnographical differentiation. As non-profit service centers of libraries, geographic locality and size are learning the facts about this global health crisis, informing the different communities and adapting community-centric emerging services and facilities to meet changing community information needs and expectations during these health emergencies. It is time to realize and remind the social communities of the essentialness of libraries and their library professionals to collect, organize, preserve, and disseminate information through different virtual platforms to fulfill the remotely scattered library users due to the shocking spread of COVID-19 deadly disease. This paper researcher has demonstrated the role of libraries and library professionals in selecting, collecting, organizing, preserving, and disseminating information along with challenges of library professionals to restricting library services, facilities, and other ‘user-centric’ functional activities to move on user door-steps and fulfill existing information needs.

Keywords: COVID-19, Coronavirus, Pandemic, LIS Professional, Library Services, Open Access

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