Some creatures take a long time to gestate their offspring: camels, for example, carry their pregnancies for 410 days.

The US clinical trial process is apparently similarly ponderous. Researchers have revealed that it takes US trial investigators an average of 424 days to deliver their ‘babies’ into the public domain — if they ever do.

A 2017 law requires US study results to be fully reported within one year of research completion but, according to a study from the UK’s Oxford University, fewer than half (41%) of the trials registered on ClinicalTrials.gov comply with this — and one in three remain unreported.

As it is the third year since the US Food and Drug Administration regulations were enacted, Oxford’s Dr Ben Goldacre — author of Bad Science and a longtime campaigner for transparency in research — is concerned that they’re not being enforced.