Why do meddling Eurocrats want to ban your vitamin pills?

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Subject:Why do meddling Eurocrats want to ban your vitamin pills?

Wed, 26 Jan 2005 15:01:26 -0000

 

A similar but factually incorrect article went out on the Independent

on Sunday 23/1/05

 

http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/health_medical/story.jsp?story=603785

 

Geoffrey Lean then re-submitted his original excellent article to the

Daily Mail who printed it in full (typed below as not on their

website). This mentions the Alliance for Natural Health whose work up

till now has been virtually airbrushed out of the news! Do try and

read the whole article below as it is very important and the first

time anything has been printed in the press that outlines the whole

situation.

 

Why do meddling Eurocrats want to ban your vitamin pills?

(Could it be anything to do with the drug giants hoping for huge profits?)

Daily Mail (Good Health section) 25/1/05

by Geoffrey Lean

 

Every day millions of us swallow vitamins, mineral supplements and

alternative medicines in the well founded belief that they will

benefit our health.

But in just six months, our favourite pills will be outlawed by diktat

of the European Union, aided and abetted by Tony Blair's Government

with a little help from the pharmaceutical industry, which sees a

golden opportunity to take control of a lucrative market.

From the beginning of August, thousands of popular products will

disappear from the shelves - allegedly on safety grounds - unless

last-ditch attempts to save them succeed.

Today, campaigners are asking the European Court of Justice to

over-rule the ban, which is contained in a little-publicised EU directive.

 

Led by the Alliance for Natural Health - representing both consumers

and producers - they will argue that the European Union is exceeding

its powers. But our Government - together with those of Greece and

Portugal - is joining the EU in resisting them.

And this afternoon, the Tories, in a highly unusual move, are giving

one of their rare allocations of debating time in the House of Commons

to a cross-party motion calling for the ban to be scrapped. The

motion is co-sponsored by Tory frontbencher Chris Grayling and former

Labour minister Kate Hoey and supported by MPs from all parties.

If these two last-minute bids fail and the honest attempts of millions

to improve their health are thwarted - the Government and the EU will

face an explosion of outrage and hostility.

Already, one million people have signed a petition condemning the ban

and MPs have received heaps of letters.

 

Celebrities such as Dame Judi Dench, Dame Joan Plowright, Bianca

Jagger, Jenny Seagrove and Cherie Blair's ertwhile guru, Carole Caplin

have also lobbied against it. But so far, every protest, every

argument has fallen on tightly closed ears in Brussels, Whitehall and

Downing Street.

 

We are heading for an Alice Through the Looking Glass world, where, in

Chris Grayling's words: 'It will be illegal for a grown adult to buy

vitamin tablets but legal for a teenager to purchase cigarettes.'

More than 40% of us take mineral and vitamin pills; a third of us take

them every day. Like all alternative medicines they provoke

controversies, some stirred up by a medical establishment and drug

companies who fear that people will prefer them to their expensive drugs.

Some studies do suggest that some alternative products may endanger

health if taken at recklessly high doses - though they are not in the

same league as the damage caused by side-effects from prescription

drugs, which one authoritative study concludes are the fourth biggest

cause of death in the United States, after heart disease, cancer and

strokes.

On the other hand, research shows that a lack of minerals and vitamins

increases the risk of cancer and heart disease - and that levels of

them are dropping alarmingly in modern diets.

 

This would suggest it is sensible to take the pills - and indeed a

recent study by the American Medical Association shows that some do

offer protection against these killer diseases.

This seems to make no difference to the EU which has gone about

banning them in a particularly underhand way - through the Food

Supplements Directive, a measure aimed at harmonising trade -

following intense lobbying by drug companies.

The Directive stipulates that no supplements can be sold after August

1 that contain minerals or vitamins unless they are on a restricted -

and apparently illogical - 'approved list'.

Incredibly , some controversial compounds such as sodium fluoride,

used to kill pests, and caustic soda, used to clean drains are on the

list, while scores of safe, non-toxic ingredients believed to benefit

health, are excluded.

Campaigners calculate that about 300 of the 420 forms of minerals and

vitamins contained in some 5,000 supplments on sale in Braitian will

be outlawed.

 

Some minerals - such as vanadium, silicon and boron - are banned

entirely. More often, says the Alliance for Natural Health,

relatively crude forms of minerals and vitamins are allowed, while the

more sophisticated ones preferred by alternative medicine

practitioners are banned.

For example, it says, forms of iron known to cause stomach upsets in

some people will be permitted, while ones taken up more easily by the

body will be outlawed.

And naturally occurring folic acid - found in spinach - will be

banned, while the form sold by pharmaceutical companies will be allowed.

Other products may escape the ban, if special 'safety dossiers' on

them are submitted. But the small companies that make them cannot

afford the cost - at up to £250,000 an ingredient for products that

may contain many.

 

Is this just bureaucracy gone mad? Or something more sinister?

There's a clue in the contents of that approved list: by and large,

vitamins and minerals produced by big drug companies are on it, while

ones made by small, specialist firms are not.

Another clue is provided by the fact that the big drug companies have

welcomed the ban. Well, they would, wouldn't they? They say

customers will notice little difference as most of their products will

be on sale as usual.

 

They win both ways. Competition from sophisticated alternative

medicines will be greatly reduced and they will be well-placed to

dominate any residual market for the supplements, as smaller firms are

forced out of business.

 

And what are we to make of this Government, which refuses to take

adequate action on known perils like salt and fat in foods on the

grounds that people have the right to decide what they consume, so

long as they do not harm others?

Is it just being illogical in taking the opposite view over vitamins

and minerals? Or is it being consistent in promoting the profits of

giant food and drugs companies over the health of the people it is

supposed to represent?

The answer seems inescapable, and disgraceful. And there is worse to

come. For this is just the start of an EU bid to get rid of most

alternative medicines; a similar ban on herbal pills is in the pipeline.

 

In their cynicism, Whitehall and Brussels are sowing dragons' teeth.

For the outrage at the ban is likely to hit its peak just as they are

seeking Britons' approval in a referendum on the European constitution.

And such blatant interference in personal freedom is likely to turn

many more people against the EU than the Euro.

Already some ministers sense the danger. Peter Hain has condemned the

proposed ban as 'unnecessary interference'. It is hard to disagree.

For, as a long-standing supporter of the European ideal, I have to

admit that the shameful story of the supplements illustrates the very

abuse of power about which the sceptics have long warned us.

 

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