Sir

As a former French postdoc currently in 'exile' in England, mainly because of the depressing state of the current research system in France, I was outraged by Dr P.-L. Chau's Correspondence “Reality hits postdocs earlier in France” (Nature 414, 582; 2001) responding to your News article (Nature 414, 145; 2001). I can only assume that Chau is talking of another France, maybe on another planet, or that he mistakenly confuses the French tenured research system and the officially nonexistent (in terms of legal and social status) French postdoctoral system.

Postdocs in France are anything but civil servants, are typically at the mercy of their principal investigator, are often unable to conduct the research they want, and have to spend their time begging for short-term funding which, even if successful, barely supports a decent living. Of course one must not generalize, and progress is being made in improving the situation. But having experienced the system myself, and knowing numerous people who have suffered from it, or are still fighting to get a position in France, Chau's Correspondence is both erroneous and extremely depressing to all French postdocs.

Reality certainly hits the researcher earlier in France, but it couldn't hit any later than the PhD stage because by that time the person concerned is already working abroad.