misguided FDA

[Guest guest]

Until the FDA can or decides to try and stop the hundreds of thousands of people who "choose" to kill themselves each year from cigarettes and alcohol and fast food and also the many thousands those who die against their wishes and intent from prescription drugs, I wish they would leave me alone and let me also exercise my own "choice" to take whatever herbs or supplements I would like, at my own peril. I would rather take my chances with the odds of dying from herbs than any of these other substances. How many people have died from OTC supplements compared to these other things?

And since this is about the only civilized industrial nation that can't seem to enable an affordable health care system for all it's citizens, I wish the government would stop trying to prevent me from treating myself with what little resources I might have at my disposal.

Re: Digest Number 108

At 09:28 AM 12/29/2002 -0500, you wrote:>In a message dated 12/29/02 7:14:15, lipodystrophy writes:>>>the FDA is about to allow unverified health claims on food labels.>>They already do this, essentially, on food supplements. The result will >be an increase in fraud.Not entirely. The only claims that can be made for food or dietary supplements are related to their effects on structure and function. These must also be based on some degree of scientific agreement. The argument formerly made by industry was that the phrase "significant scientific agreement" set a bar as high or higher than over-priced drugs. Without patents, industry claimed, there was no rationale to do the degree of studies required. Over the past few years, the industry has seen substantial increases in sales, thus the industry is richer than it once was.By contrast, they are NOT permitted to make claims about medical indications without data that rises to a reasonable, scientific level.Thus, a food product or supplement can claim that calcium and vitamin D3 are good for your bones. They cannot say that they will treat osteopenia.Can fraud happen? Are false claims made within these parameters? Are false claims made *outside* these parameters? Of course. That happens with pharmaceutical drugs too--witness the hit-and-run advertising that they put on the air, get people freaked about a "new" disease and increase prescription rates. Sleaze tends to happen with big business. There needs to be oversight, regulation and cost controls for both the pharmaceutical and nutriceutical industries.ly, this does not help those of us who choose to eat or use supplements for medical reasons. We need a practical and sensible regulatory system to1) evaluate potency and purity of foods and supplements;2) evaluate medical value through good clinical trials.Funding for the latter can come from industry and the NIH.By contrast, FIAR hopes to develop novel sources of funding to undertake studies (e.g., foundation grants, certain corporate contributions) to evaluate medical efficacy--or lack thereof. M.