Research Ethics Committees in the UK—the Pressure is Now on Research and Development Departments

Picture this.You have a research question of international importance.Against the odds, you have secured noncommercial funding for a well-designed multicentre project that will answer the question.Naturally, you must obtain research ethics committee (REC) approval.You apply to an REC online.After clarifying questions about your application on just one occasion, you get a decision at no charge, within 60 days, and it is valid for the whole of your country.While this scenario is a fantasy in countries such as the USA, 1 Canada, 2 and Australia, 3 a recent Department of Health (DoH) report celebrates this new era of REC operation in the UK. 4 But to what extent do the procedures in the UK meet this ideal, and have they improved?Do other regulatory hurdles lurk in the shadow cast by the mighty new REC system?In other words, is British researchers' long battle against red tape over?