Useful Flexibilities for Animal Care and Use Programs to Comply with the PHS Policy During the COVID-19 Pandemic

As we continue to address the effects of COVID-19 and as some states and institutions are considering reopening, we would like to share some administrative flexibilities that NIH is providing to research institutions with laboratory animal programs. These flexibilities are meant to assure personnel safety and animal welfare while enabling research personnel to prioritize and preserve research efforts. Some of these can be useful in reducing administrative burden, too. My colleagues with the NIH Office of Laboratory Animal Welfare (OLAW), Drs. Catharine Pritchard, Nicolette Petervary, and Neera Gopee, described these administrative flexibilities in their recent contribution to Laboratory Animal Science Professional (available on the OLAW website). If you’d like more information to help your animal program during this pandemic, please visit OLAW’s frequently updated COVID-19 webpage for additional resources. FAQs were also recently updated last week. Here are some highlights: OLAW wants to ensure Institutional Animal Care and Use Committees (IACUCs) can continue functioning during the pandemic, while also promoting a safe environment for all. To this end, OLAW is temporarily granting waivers to semiannual inspections, and the article describes the process for requesting these waivers. The remaining flexibilities presented here are always available to institutions but may be particularly useful during pandemics. Virtual is doable. One flexibility is that IACUCs...
Source: NIH Extramural Nexus - Category: Research Authors: Tags: blog Open Mike Animal Welfare COVID-19 OLAW Source Type: funding