Supplement Regulation: Who's Behind It, and Why Should You Oppose It?

[Guest guest]

 

KD Weber <wvadreamin

 

Wednesday, 3 September 2003 2:38

Supplement Regulation: Who's Behind It, and Why Should You Oppose

It?

 

 

" We have a ticking time bomb on our hands. To defuse it we have to make

sure ANH http://www.alliance-natural-health.org gets sufficient funds to be

able to file the lawsuit to overturn the EU FSD no later than mid

September. "

ED NOTE: If you want to help, contact: John Hammell, International

Advocates for Health Freedom, POB 10632, Blacksburg VA 24062 USA; Websites:

http://www.iahf.com and http://iadsa-exposed.tripod.com; Telephone:

800-333-2553

 

-

<PLANETNEWS

<undisclosed-recipients:;>

Sunday, August 31, 2003 3:02 PM

Big Pharma wants to control your health...

 

 

 

Supplement Regulation: Who's Behind It, and Why Should You Oppose It?

by Brian W. Vaszily

 

Let's make sure that all vitamin and herbal supplements are clinically

proven to do what they claim, and that they're safe, before they reach the

consumer. Let's ensure that their ingredients are closely monitored, and

that their labels and advertisements tell the truth and nothing but, so that

their consumption can be based on informed and confident decisions.

 

What pretty ideals. Pretty enough, in fact, for a host of politicians and

governments, and the pharmaceutical corporations that control them, to hide

a considerably more ugly agenda behind.

 

Right now a war is being fought over the regulation of supplements, with the

various battles at different stages in countries across the globe. The

European Union already passed its Food Supplements Directive in July of

2002, framing it on the principle that supplements should be proven safe and

effective in the same manner as pharmaceuticals. The UK did not immediately

implement this directive, but will do so come the end of this month.

Australia, Canada, New Zealand and a host of other nations are involved in

their own battles, and here in the U.S. Senator Dick Durbin's proposed

" Dietary Supplement Safety Act of 2003, " one of the first shots in what will

undoubtedly become a mounting campaign.

 

In general, the claim behind these bills and directives supporting tighter

(and tighter and tighter) restrictions on supplements is that they will make

the world a safer place for us, the consumers. Yeah, and so would military

occupation of our towns and cities. In reality, it will have a polar effect

on our health and safety. And it will be chilling.

 

Keeping You on the Motherland

 

On a routine basis, Cubans attempt to escape their homeland on boats bound

for U.S. shores. The ocean waters are certainly not safe, and there are

rarely any guarantees waiting for them here. Nonetheless, the potential, the

possibilities, are a far better option than the dangerously flawed regime

they are trying to leave behind.

 

This is an apt metaphor in this situation. Because if one thing is certain

it is this: the conventional healthcare system, our Cuba, is seriously

diseased. It is dominated by industries who are motivated by profit and who

therefore foster whatever will most increase their profits, your health be

damned. For example, processed food is far cheaper to produce, deliver and

store than much healthier whole foods, and so it's processed foods that are

dumped en masse into our supermarkets, restaurants and brains. And

prescription drugs that merely treat symptoms versus prevent or cure the

underlying causes are a whole lot more profitable because, well, when they

keep you coming back for more and more treatment, they've made a customer

for life.

 

Most people, meanwhile, have been brainwashed by this conventional

healthcare regime. They don't even realize their daily habits like eating

are the primary part of their healthcare, and so it's quite easy for their

habits and assumptions to be manipulated by the regime. Only when they get

sick or overweight does their perception of healthcare, fostered by the

pharmaceutical companies and others on that side of the regime, kick in:

they will go to the doctor to get a prescription to " save " them. And these

days, in almost 70% of all patient visits, physicians do indeed give them

the drugs they crave. But if that doesn't work, if things get serious or

seriously inconvenient, they move on to surgery. Of course, most

prescription drugs and surgeries, reflecting conventional healthcare as a

whole, have nothing to do with prevention and addressing the causes of

illness -- they're all about merely treating symptoms so people can move on

with their unhealthy lifestyles and get more symptoms that need treating.

It's great for repeat business.

 

Some people, however, are aware of the deadly downward spiral of the

conventional healthcare system. They are refugees from an oppressive system,

to be blunt about it, seeking better alternatives to prevent and cure

illness, and live longer. And here is the key point of the matter that's

caused this recent surge in opposition to supplements: their numbers are

increasing dramatically, and they are finding those better alternatives.

 

Between 1997 and 2001, there was a 15% increase in sales of vitamin/mineral

supplements. In 2002, the overall market for the alternatives to

prescription drugs, processed and fast food, and surgery -- that is,

natural/organic foods, dietary supplements and other natural products -- was

$37 billion.

 

Those numbers, that attempt to escape from conventional healthcare's

stranglehold, is what is behind the recent worldwide war being waged on the

leader among alternatives at over $17 billion annually, supplements. And

it's those dictators at the top of conventional medicine, such as the

pharmaceutical companies and the governments they own, driving this war.

 

You see, all these alternates like supplements are actually getting people

to believe they can prevent illness and avoid trips to doctors' offices, and

it's starting to make a dent in their mega-profits, and threatens to make a

much bigger dent.

 

They want to blockade your passage to potentially better shores and force

you to stay in their Cuba. They'll put it in pretty terms of course, try to

package it as something else like " safety, " but that's what they're trying

to do, and already in Europe, apparently succeeding in doing.

 

Let the Deadly Dictators Do the Dictating?

 

Thomas Moore, a senior fellow in health policy at the George Washington

University Medical Center, estimates that prescription drugs -- those

reviewed and approved by the FDA -- contribute to 100,000 U.S. deaths each

year. One prominent reason for this that I'll visit in an upcoming article

is that the entire research and approval process for new drugs is a hoax --

in short, drug makers now pay private for-profit companies to do the

clinical studies establishing safety, and the drug companies have a major

say in what is and is not reported. Meanwhile, who knows how many deaths

they indirectly contribute to by veering people toward an over-dependency on

their quick " fixes " and away from a preventative and curative approach to

health?

 

On another front, the overweight/obesity epidemic, fed by other giants

profiting heartily on their thrones in the healthcare motherland, is now

directly linked to 300,000 deaths per year.

 

Sure, everybody's " gotta' go sometime, " but the numbers above -- only a very

partial list, mind you -- are far too many going far too soon because they

are trapped in the conventional health paradigm. Meanwhile, even Senator

Dick Durbin, in his 03/26/03 press release promoting his Dietary Supplement

Safety Act, states that " scientific reports have linked ephedra

and similar dietary supplements to 117 deaths and more than 17,000 other

health related problems. "

 

You do the math. In fact, go ahead and play devil's advocate by assuming

that the number of deaths resulting from conventional health are

overblown -- perhaps it's only a couple hundred thousand yearly total --

while those from supplements are too conservative -- perhaps it's actually

several hundred yearly total. And then do the math.

 

Where does the real problem that needs addressing reside?

 

It is precisely those at the heart of this problem that want to " regulate "

supplements.

 

Pardon me for stepping out of the party line, but why would I possibly trust

them to make the supplement industry " safe and effective " when I see the

monster they've created with conventional healthcare? Why would you?

 

So What Should You Be Swallowing?

 

None of this is to say, " So trust everything the supplement makers tell you

and consume, consume, consume! "

 

There are a lot of exaggerated claims, inconsistent ingredients between

supposedly like products, and other confusion surrounding supplements. I'm

sure you wish you could walk into any old store, or log onto any Web site,

and know for certain that when an herbal claimed it could help prevent

disease, restore youth, and repel rude people, those claims would be backed

by solid clinical evidence. But you can't.

 

For that matter, I'm sure you wish you could trust the big businesses and

governments to fairly and honestly test vitamins and herbals so we could

make more informed and confident decisions in this respect. But then you

learn things like this: a major study undertaken to discredit the herbal St.

John's wart in 2001 received " unrestricted funding " from the pharmaceutical

company Pfizer. St. John's wort, an anti-depressant, has sales of over $400

million per year, cutting a niche into the profit of

Pfizer's prescription anti-depressant Zoloft, and Pfizer doesn't like to

lose profit. It's not the first or last time a supplement was discredited in

an " independent " study that received major pharmaceutical company dollars.

Of course, such knowledge (and there's a lot more of it to be had) entirely

shoots down any trust in the conventional healthcare establishment.

 

And so all that's left is reality. And reality is, you must trust your

judgment more than any other person or institution when it comes to your

health. That means doing whatever you feel is necessary to trust a

supplement enough to try it -- researching its claims and source, or fnding

a source you trust to recommend the proper supplements to you. When doing

your own " due diligence " to research a supplement, it's obviously worthwhile

to obtain third-party information about the product, such as the research

and evidence offered, versus just being inspired by the claims on the

product package or advertisement. A host of other supplements may be

necessary for those with certain conditions, and it's worth searching this

site by inputting the name of whatever condition you are interested in to

find more information.

 

To conclude, there are two choices today: the main choice, the conventional

healthcare paradigm, and the alternatives, which include supplements. The

main choice, being rather deadly, is really no choice at all. Meanwhile,

some of these alternatives are indeed pure nonsense, others are

questionable, and some have already been proven as sound and worthwhile. But

the point is, we all have the capacity, and at least some of us still have

the legal ability, to choose from among these alternatives.

 

The bills and directives across the world to " regulate " supplements are

being pushed by the same powers-that-be that turned conventional healthcare

into a sick joke for their own greedy ends. With " regulation, " they would be

the ones controlling the alternatives... and so go the alternatives.

 

Or to put it back into the Cuban metaphor, it's as if Fidel Castro himself

announced to all those trying to escape his oppressive regime that he will

now be running a refugee ferryboat service to the shores of Florida. All

aboard?

 

Me, I'll take my chances swimming.