Animal-welfare sections in papers not the way
Animal-welfare section in papers would be a burden : Article : Nature
Dr C. Jimenez writes in Correspondence this week (Nature 447, 259; 2007):
Victoria Buck in Correspondence ('Who will start the 3Rs ball rolling for animal welfare?' Nature 446, 856; 2007) calls for journals to include an animal-welfare category in the methods section of papers describing research on live animals. I disagree.
We scientists have far too many things to do to add yet another bureaucratic burden to writing papers for no useful reason. I agree that sharing information about the way animals are treated and handled during experiments could be useful, but that can and should be done in another forum.
We pay expensive rates for our animal-care facilities and personnel, and are quite often stymied by the countless new rules and regulations, many of which serve no real useful purpose other than making us jump through more hoops. We are almost regulated to inaction.
It is time for scientists to stand up and say enough is enough, even if it bucks the trend, so we can get on with our work.
See previous Nautilus post and comments on the question of animal-welfare sections in scientific papers.
