Fwd: * * * DHEA, Pregnenolone, etc. Soon to Be Illegal?!

[Guest guest]

(crosspost from another group)

 

I received this, which I think is important enough that I recommend

you

post it to other forums you belong to. If you are against the U.S.

Congress passing a law that will make DHEA and Pregnenolone and

other supplements that you can now buy in health food stores without

a prescription into a Class III medicine, then you had better let

your Congressmen and Senators know how you feel, soon. - Ellis

====================================================

 

Anti-Aging Supplements Soon to Be Illegal?! Page 1 of 5

 

http://www.mesomorphosis.com/articles/arnold/anti-andro-bill.htm

 

12/17/02 Anti-Aging Supplements Soon to Be Illegal?! DHEA, 7-Keto

DHEA,

Pregnenolone Unforeseen Victims of Anti-Andro Bill. If you're one of

the

millions of Americans who enjoy and benefit from anti-aging

supplements, be

afraid. Be very afraid. Certain members of Congress are intent on

taking them

away from you, and placing you under arrest if you possess them!

Sounds far-

fetched? It's frighteningly real, extremely serious, and absolutely

imminent!

 

But amazingly, practically nobody in the anti-aging / life-extension

community is aware of it, much less is denouncing it in the media.

 

The villain is the so-called " Anti-Andro Bill " – H.R. 5564 –

introduced last

October by U.S. Representatives Sweeney and Osborne. Purporting to

address the

use of muscle-building " andro " supplements by teens, this alarming

and wildly

overbroad bill would have devastating effects on mature adults

throughout

America. It would actually permit the Drug Enforcement Administration

(DEA) to

schedule a wide variety of currently over-the-counter nutritional

supplements

as controlled substances.

 

In effect, this bill would authorize the arrest and criminal

prosecution of

millions of Americans as drug offenders -- just for possessing

supplements

like DHEA, 7-keto DHEA, and pregnenolone! Those caught with these

currently

legal supplements -- proven to have powerful health benefits and anti-

aging

properties -- would even be subject to federal asset forfeiture laws,

permitting the government to seize and retain private property! All

this

would be done by making an end-run around the proper lawful

procedures, and

without any evidence of legitimate public health concerns or dangers

to

American adults. The bill seeks to deal a staggering blow to

nutritional

supplement freedom and the Dietary Supplements Health and Education

Act

(DSHEA)!

 

Sounds too outrageous to be true? Think again! The Anatomy of H.R.

5564

The intention of the bill is supposedly to keep testosterone

precursors like

androstenedione away from teens. But rather than restricting sales of

these

items to minors, H.R. 5564 would restrict all steroid hormone

precursors

from people of all ages. And not by making them prescription

medicines, but

by reclassifying them as controlled substances (see sidebar for the

specific

definition of what a " controlled substance " is).

 

The bill would accomplish this by " bootstrapping " these compounds

into the

federal Anabolic Steroid Control Act. This act was a 1990 revision to

the

original Controlled Substances Act of 1970, and it reclassified

anabolic

steroids from simple prescription medicines to highly restricted

Schedule

III controlled substances. Mere possession of a schedule III

controlled

substance without a valid prescription is a federal drug offense with

serious

potential penalties that can even include jail time.

 

Let's look at the actual language of the bill. It's crucial that life

extensionists and anti-aging enthusiasts understand what this

language really

means, because it was written that way for a reason. That reason,

chillingly,

is to allow the government to extend its grasp far beyond

testosterone

precursors and teens, giving them the power to control non-andro

steroid

hormone precursors (DHEA, 7-keto DHEA, pregnenolone, etc.) and the

mature

adults who take them. The following is the heart of the bill:

 

 

SECTION 1. SCHEDULING OF CERTAIN SUBSTANCES.

(a) DEFINITION- Section 102(23) of the Controlled Substances Act (21

U.S.C.=

802(23)) is amended--

(1) by striking `(A)' and inserting `(B)(i)';

 

(2) by striking `(B)' and inserting `(ii);

 

(3) by striking `©' and inserting `(iii); and

 

(4) by inserting after `means a substance--' the following new

subparagraph:

 

(A) which the Attorney General has found to be, and by regulation

designated as being, the immediate chemical precursor of an anabolic

steroid that has been scheduled as a controlled substance

(hereinafter in

this subparagraph referred to as `scheduled anabolic steroid') which

either is a metabolite of a scheduled anabolic steroid or is

transformed

in the body directly into a scheduled anabolic steroid or the

metabolite

of a scheduled anabolic steroid; or'.

 

(b) PLACEMENT ON SCHEDULE- Section 201(e) of the Controlled Substances

Act (21 U.S.C. 811(e)) is amended--

 

(1) by inserting `or for the immediate precursor of a scheduled

anabolic

steroid, without regard to the requirements of section 102(41),

including

the requirement that the substance promote muscle growth' after

`section

202(b)'; and

 

(2) by adding at the end the following: `However, once an immediate

precursor described in section 102(23)(A) is placed in a schedule

pursuant

to this section, it becomes a controlled substance and the Attorney

General

may schedule an immediate precursor of that substance in accordance

with

this section.

 

While all this legalese may seem overly technical, it's very

important to

understand the scope of what's written here. The key language starts

in

paragraph 1(a)(4). This is where the primary qualifications for a

controlled

steroid precursor are outlined in a new subparagraph " (A) " .

 

Interpreted simply, this new subparagraph says that an immediate

precursor

to a controlled anabolic steroid shall itself become a controlled

anabolic

steroid. Case in point: immediately upon passage of this bill,

androstenedione,

which is the precursor to the controlled anabolic steroid

testosterone, will

automatically become a controlled steroid.

 

All right, that part is pretty obvious. It's in subsection 1(b) where

the

sneakiness begins. First off, look at the troubling language of

paragraph

1(b)(1): " …without regard to … the requirement that the substance

promote

muscle growth " (emphasis added). This language changes the bill from

one

designed to simply eliminate the supposedly muscle-promoting andro

products,

to a bill that eliminates ALL steroid precursors – such as anti-aging

precursors like 7-keto and pregnenolone that have absolutely nothing

to do

with muscle mass.

 

Precursors of Precursors of Precursors…

 

Okay, so the real intention is revealed in 1(b)(1). It's in 1(b)(2)

that

the mechanics of how the anti-aging steroid precursors will be swept

up.

This paragraph states, in effect, that not only precursors of

anabolic

steroids will be controlled, but precursors of precursors of anabolic

steroids, and then precursors of precursors of precursors, etc. Get

the

picture? This is the silver bullet, folks, because look at how it

works:

 

This is one of the main metabolic pathways of pregnenolone to

testosterone.

H.R. 5564 is written so that androstenedione, because of its

conversion to

testosterone, becomes classified as a controlled substance. Now,

according

to paragraph 1(b)(2), the Attorney General can then declare DHEA a

controlled substance because it is the immediate precursor of

androstenedione,

now a controlled substance.

 

As soon as that is completed, the process can repeat itself with

17alpha-hydroxypregenolone and finally end with pregnenolone being

classified. There they go, like dominoes, all criminalized by simple

administrative act. At that point, there's not much any person,

agency, or

citizen's action group can do about it. It's already the law of the

land,

and you're a criminal if you violate it.

 

Don't Forget the Metabolites! What about 7-keto DHEA? Does it escape

the

tentacles of this far-reaching bill? No hope there, I'm afraid. They

were

careful not to leave that one out. Take a look at this:

 

7-keto DHEA is not a precursor of DHEA; however it is a metabolite.

Now if

you look back to the new subparagraph (A) proposed in 1(a)(4), you

will see

that they modified the language to include metabolites as well. They

obviously wrote this bill with the intention to make it as broad in

scope as

possible – to go beyond just the andro-type immediate precursors and

to swipe

up every steroid hormone precursor product being sold today as a

nutritional

supplement!!!

 

Wake Up, America!

 

If you are a life extensionist or anti-aging supplement user, then we

are

going to spell it out for you. Don't be deceived by the stated goals

of

this bill. This dangerous bill tries to sneak dietary products that

are dear

to you into a bill that is being promoted to Congress and to the

media as

seeking to ban over-the-counter anabolic steroids. With images of

kids taking

andro to hit home runs like Mark McGwire in the mind of Congress,

coupled

with the support of the United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA), the

NFL,

and the NCAA, the political pressure to vote for this bill is almost

overwhelming.

 

Unfortunately, what the proponents of this bill are NOT telling

anyone is

that this bill is about a lot more than andro. It's also about

sneaking in

as many other supplements as possible – supplements that do NOT have

the

stigma of andro, and that otherwise would be much more difficult to

eliminate

from shelves. You Must Act Immediately!!

 

H.R. 5564 is a high priority bill that has received tremendous media

coverage the past several weeks in a wide variety of outlets

including The

New York Times and The Washington Post. Rep. Sweeney has made clear

that he

is going to push as hard as possible to get it passed quickly.

Unfortunately,

right now there is practically no resistance to this bill. With its

politically popular " save our teens " message and well-hidden assaults

on

adult freedoms, H.R. 5564 is basically a home run – that is, unless

we act

and act quickly !! Scream out to the politicians on Capitol Hill that

mature

American adults want supplement freedom, not an expansion of the war

on drugs

into our very own neighborhood health food stores! Please contact the

United

Supplement Freedom Association, Inc. (USFA), a not-for-profit

coalition

dedicated to the preservation of nutritional freedoms for American

adults.

You can visit online right now at

 

www.USFA.biz

 

where you can click on the Anti-Aging section and follow the

instructions

on how to petition your congressional representatives to demand that

they

fight this bill!! A form letter and list of representatives is

available.

 

Alternatively, you can write and contribute to the USFA through the

association's general counsel, Rick Collins, Esq., United Supplement

Freedom Association, Inc., One Old Country Road, Suite 250, Carle

Place,

New York, 11514.

 

WE must act immediately to let our voice be heard, or face the

beginning

of the end of our supplement freedoms!!! What is a " Controlled

Substance " ?

While many drugs require a prescription from a physician, some drugs

are

deemed so dangerous that further restrictions are warranted. These

drugs are

called " controlled substances. " According to Rick Collins, Esq.,

performance

drug and supplement legal expert and General Counsel for the USFA,

federal

law has created five schedules of these controlled substances.

Anabolic

steroids are in Schedule III. In order to put a drug into Schedule

III, the

government has to find that it meets certain requirements:

 

l (A) The drug or other substance has a potential for abuse less than

the

drugs or other substances in schedules I and II.

 

l (B) The drug or other substance has a currently accepted medical

use in

treatment in the United States.

 

l © Abuse of the drug or other substance may lead to moderate or

low

physical dependence or high psychological dependence. How does the

government

decide if a drug meets the requirements to become a controlled

substance?

 

The authority to add new substances to the schedules is given to the

Attorney

General. To start the inquiry, he's supposed to request an

evaluation and

recommendations from the Secretary of Health and Human Services

regarding the

drug's potential for abuse and the need for scheduling. H.R. 5564

circumvents

the established procedures, and attempts to classify all steroid

hormone

precursors simply by act of Congress.

 

What crisis compels such a radical act? What evidence suggests that

health-

affirming substances like DHEA, 7-keto DHEA and pregnenolone have a

potential

for abuse or dependence of any kind? Absolutely none.

 

Most life extensionists and anti-aging enthusiasts would agree that

no such

potential exists, and that to schedule these compounds as drugs of

abuse

is ludicrous. Particularly troubling, as Mr. Collins points out, is

that

controlled substance status carries with it serious consequences.

Controlled

substances fall under the jurisdiction of the DEA, not the FDA. If

H.R. 5564

passes, the mere unlawful possession of steroid hormone precursors

will be a

federal crime punishable – like the possession of narcotics and other

hard

drugs – with a range of potential sentences including incarceration.

Bottom

line from Mr. Collins: this bill will put otherwise law-abiding

mature adults

in jail for what are now health food store nutritional supplements!

--- End forwarded message ---