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Science 25 March 2005:
Vol. 307. no. 5717, p. 1851
DOI: 10.1126/science.307.5717.1851c
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ScienceScope

Figure 1 NEW DELHI--The Indian government has decided to phase out veterinary use of a painkiller implicated in the catastrophic decline of vultures on the subcontinent. Officials are now asking farmers to replace diclofenac with alternatives, like ketoprofen and meloxicam, believed to be less toxic to the birds.

Vultures carry out an important function in the food chain. But their once-abundant numbers have dropped precipitously in the past decade, and studies in India, Pakistan, and Nepal have found the drug in dead vultures. "The only way of saving the vultures was to ban the use of the drug in animals," says Asad Rahmani, director of the Bombay Natural History Society. The decision, announced last week by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, embraces a recommendation from the government's National Board for Wildlife, which proposed a 6-month phaseout.

CREDIT: P. BAGLA




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