Posts Tagged ‘Senate and FDA working to banish supplements’
Supplements in Danger Again
September 24th, 2010 | 
Author: Congress Seeks to put Dietary Supplement Makers in Jail for Ten Years!
by William Faloon, LEF.org
Pharmaceutical companies are once again interfering with your ability to access information about dietary supplements.
The Senate is debating a bill that will enable the FDA to put vitamin supplement makers in jail for ten years if they cite findings from peer-reviewed published scientific studies on the label of their dietary supplements or their web site.
The pretext for these draconian proposals is a bill titled the Food Safety Accountability Act (S. 3767). The ostensible purpose of the bill is to punish anyone who knowingly contaminates food for sale. Since there are already strong laws to punish anyone who commits this crime, this bill serves little purpose other than enriching pharmaceutical interests.
The sinister scheme behind this bill is to exploit the public’s concern about food safety. Drug companies want to convince your Senators that an overreaching law needs to be enacted to grant the FDA powers to define “food contamination” any way it chooses.
Even today, the FDA can proclaim a dietary supplement as “misbranded” even if the best science in the world is used to describe its biological effects in the body. The concern is that the FDA will use the term “misbranded” in the same way it defines “adulterated” in order to jail dietary supplement makers as if they were selling contaminated food.
The new bill being debated in the Senate increases the penalties the FDA can use to threaten supplement makers to ten years in prison. The big issue here is that the FDA will use this as a hammer to threaten and coerce small companies into signing crippling consent decrees that will deny consumers access to truthful non-misleading information about natural approaches to protect against age-related disease.
Please tell your two Senators to OPPOSE the Food Safety Accountability Act (S. 3767). You can do this in a few minutes on our convenient Legislative Action Center on our Web site. Click here to take action now.
If you’d like to read the legal details about this bill, log on to the Alliance for Natural Health Web site: http://www.anh-usa.org/breaking-new…
Health-conscious consumers have succeeded in preventing Congress from capitulating to the pharmaceutical industry this year. Please continue this string of victories by telling your Senators to OPPOSE this underhanded attempt (S. 3767) to grant the FDA dictatorial new powers.
Due to the short session before Congress adjourns for the election, please alert your two Senators today!
For longer life,
William Faloon
Posted in FDA, Food Safety, Legislation | 
Tags: Food safety bill, Senate and FDA working to banish supplements | 
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Senator Durbin all for FDA control of supplements
- Image by Getty Images via @daylife
Well, I received a follow up email from Senator Durbin that made me feel so loved, protected, and warm and cozy… are you sick yet?
Dear Ms. Pagan:
Thank you for contacting me regarding the Dietary Supplement Safety Act of 2010 (S. 3002). I appreciate hearing from you.
Dietary supplements are safely consumed by millions of Americans every day. I take a multivitamin every morning. The vast majority of these supplements do not result in harm to the consumer and have been safely used in the marketplace for many years.
Senator McCain of Arizona introduced the Dietary Supplement Safety Act to require dietary supplement manufacturers to register with the U.S. Food & Drug Administration (FDA) and fully disclose the ingredients of their products. If the ingredients are not approved by the FDA, the products would be subject to removal from the marketplace. Manufacturers would be required to report all adverse reactions and to demonstrate to the FDA that new dietary ingredients are safe.
I have heard from constituents who wonder why Congress is considering additional legislation when most dietary supplements are perfectly safe and may be beneficial. Sadly, some manufacturers do not put the safety of their customers first. Reputable manufacturers with safe products have nothing to hide. At the same time, I understand your concerns that increasing FDA’s authority to regulate supplements may limit consumer access to some products. I will keep your concerns in mind as this legislation is discussed on the Senate floor.
Thank you again for your message. Please feel free to keep in touch.
Sincerely,
Richard J. Durbin
United States Senator
Sorry Dick. The price of my vitamins will go up substantially due to this stupid legislation. And if the FDA hasn’t ‘approved’ a substance, you won’t be able to get it at all. You know all those nutrients where no RDA has been established? Gone folks!
That means -
Grapeseed extract, CoQ10, Seratonin, Lycopene, L-Arginine, St. John’s Wort, and a whole long list of popular supplements will be gone in a flash.
The FDA has been waiting for this ever since they started their vendetta against supplements in the 1950s.
If everyone ate healthy and took supplements, we wouldn’t have much need for big pharma or the FDA, would we?
How many deaths are there from supplements? How many deaths are there from FDA approved medications?
Tell me again Senator what exactly you’re protecting me from…
Yeah, that leaves me feeling so protected. The FDA is the laughing stock of the world.
The only thing the FDA protects is big industry profits. Its apparently true of our Congress too.
I seriously will not vote for anyone who signs this stupid bill. I’m fed up!
I think this election we should vote out pretty much everyone and start over. What do you think?
