The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) recently proposed revisions to the regulations for the protection of human subjects in research. On October 30, the National Coalition for History (NCH) submitted comments to HHS on the proposed rule. NCH’s comments focused on the treatment of oral history under the rule and strongly endorsed the recommendation to exclude oral history from the “Common Rule.”  

Fifteen NCH member organizations also endorsed the comments and were listed as individual signatories. We have provided a background paper on the issue on our website which can be found clicking here.

A Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) was published in the Federal Register on September 8, 2015, with a 90-day comment period. Below is the link to the HHS webpage that summarizes the issue and the proposed rule itself. https://www.hhs.gov/ohrp/humansubjects/regulations/nprmhome.html To see the comments of other organizations and individuals click here.