Your Right to Use Vitamins Is in Jeopardy, Senators Push Regulatory Assault on Vitamins

HUMAN EVENTS ^ | 09.03.03 | Dr. Julian Whitaker

[Coleus]

Your Right to Use Nutritional Supplements Is in Jeopardy

Senators Push Regulatory Assault on Vitamins

by Dr. Julian Whitaker

Posted Sep 3, 2003

	Text Size:  S   M   L
	printer-friendly
	email to a friend

Government Ignores the True Cost of Medical Care 

 

Pharmaceutical Firms Latest To Learn That No Good Deed Goes Unpunished 

 

Hillary's Back! 

 

Admitting Real Costs Could Have Killed Drug Bill 

 

Medicare?s Insolvent Entitlement 

 

We need to take action, and we need to take action now. There is a movement in Congress to push through legislation that would restrict your freedom to use nutritional supplements, and could destroy the nutritional supplement industry?and, in the process, endanger your health.

Here is the problem. Reacting to the hysteria over ephedra, Sen. Richard J. Durbin (D.-Ill.) has introduced S. 722, cosponsored by colleagues Hillary Clinton (D.-N.Y.), Dianne Feinstein (D.-Calif.), and Charles Schumer (D.-N.Y.). The bill gives unprecedented power to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to remove nutritional supplements from the market. Here’s how:

• It calls for a reporting system for adverse reactions to nutritional supplements.
  
  
• It empowers the FDA to act on a single adverse reaction report and immediately take the product off the market while it is being investigated.
  
  
• In addition, the FDA could force the manufacturer to undergo prohibitively costly safety analyses of the product, similar to what is required for new drugs.
  
  Here’s a possible scenario. Mrs. Jones in Somewhere, USA, is taking a supplement containing vitamin C. One afternoon she has some diarrhea. She faints, falls in her bathroom, hits her head, and is hospitalized with a head injury.
  
  Believe it or not, an adverse reaction could be pinned on vitamin C. Based upon this single event, the FDA could at its discretion move to restrict sales of vitamin C throughout the entire country until an investigation proves that vitamin C did not cause Mrs. Jones’s problems.
  
  Smokescreen of ‘Safety’
  
  The bill also gives the FDA license to require supplement manufacturers to submit safety information that would cost hundreds of millions of dollars, patterned on regulations required for new drugs.
  
  This is absurd. New drugs need rigorous safety testing because they are compounds that have never been ingested by human beings. The ubiquitous use and long history of safety of nutritional supplements are apparently irrelevant to the sponsors of this bill.
  
  The nutritional supplement industry arguably has the best product safety record of any industry in the country. According to Rep. Dan Burton (R.-Ind.), a maximum of 16 deaths were attributed to a nutritional supplement last year. (Excessive doses of ephedra were the suspect in the majority of these cases, and the supplement link was definitively proven in only a few of them.)
  
  Meanwhile, the FDA turns a blind eye to the 106,000 deaths from adverse effects of prescription drugs and the tens of thousands of deaths from aspirin and other over-the-counter drugs that occur every year.
  
  This isn’t about safety. It’s about control.
  
  Harmful Bill
  
  This bill is a good example of government irrationality.
  
  According to a 2002 report by Washington, D.C.,-based Council for Responsible Nutrition (CRN), the use of antioxidants, folic acid, calcium, zinc, and other nutritional supplements could reduce the incidence of neural tube birth defects by 70%, hip fractures by at least 20%, and sick days caused by infectious diseases by 50%?Heart disease, stroke, cataracts, macular degeneration, some types of cancer?nutritional supplements have been shown to prevent or delay all these conditions and others.
  
  Furthermore, CRN reports that by delaying the onset of cardiovascular disease, stroke, and hip fracture alone, nutritional therapies could potentially save $89 billion a year in healthcare costs!
  
  Yet S. 722 would empower the FDA to dismantle the supplement industry and prevent you from receiving the astonishing benefits that only nutritional supplements can deliver.
  
  Immediate Action Needed
  
  The only way to stop this bill is for us to flood our elected representatives and senators with so many e-mails, faxes, and phone calls that they will be forced to say no to this bill.
  
  Grassroots Effectiveness
  
  Don’t underestimate the power of such a grassroots movement. Ten years ago, Health & Healing readers were instrumental in rallying the passing of the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act (DSHEA). Millions of letters were written to our congressmen and senators in support of this legislation?it generated more letters than any other issue in U.S. history. Because of DSHEA, which reduced the FDA’s power to block the production, sale, and use of natural substances, we have free access to herbs, amino acids, vitamins, minerals, and other nutritional supplements.
  
  An FDA Power Grab
  
  You may have read in the press that we need new laws because there is no regulation of nutritional supplements. This is simply not true. DSHEA gives the FDA tremendous regulatory power, and in fact, it already has the power to pull any supplement it feels is unsafe off the market.
  
  Yet because DSHEA also gives supplement manufacturers some autonomy, the FDA has attempted to circumvent it from day one. This agency fought hard against the passage of DSHEA ten years ago and, in a thinly veiled attempt to get rid of or amend it, has refused to act responsibly within its confines ever since.
  
  Time is of the essence. S. 722 has recently been referred to committee and may be tagged onto the Agriculture Appropriations Bill. We can and must act quickly to stop this legislation.
  
  Send a message to your senators today asking them to vote against S. 722. (See box for information.) If you’ve already done so, do it again. Tell your friends about this threat and encourage them to take action as well.
  
  If each one of you could commit to generating just a handful of e-mails, faxes, or phone calls, over a million messages would descend upon Washington. You may not realize how powerful a grassroots campaign like this can be, but our elected officials cannot ignore something of this magnitude.

  Dr. Whitaker is editor of Health and Healing, one of the country's leading health newsletters.

  Herbal Supplements and alternatives are under attack!! Take Action

  Click here to send your message now!

[discostu]

Not a false premise at all. The push is for everything to be a right. Adding sane and adult to it is just as much of a limitation as what I'm saying and just as illegitimate by the all or nothing thinking being pushed on this thread.

[Harmless Teddy Bear]

Do you agree that every American has the liberty to use vitamins (although not the right to be supplied with free vitamins)?

Absolutely! My argument was in the defining it as a right. It is a liberty. And I am all for it. And not just because I take a handful every morning.

I know it sounds nit-picky but words have certain meanings and degrading those meaning lead to confusion.

I also have an argument with the phrases "illegal immigrant" there is no such thing. It is like saying "illegal citizen". An imminent has a legal status by definition. The phrase should be illegal alien.

Or the phrase "Free Speech," once again no such thing. It is Freedom of Speech. Meaning that they can not pass a law making it illegal for you to speak. However, everything has a price. If my employer does not like my speech he is free to exercise his own freedom of speech. i.e. "You're Fired."

That is what discostu, robertpaulsen and I are trying to point out. Words have meaning. And unless we use them properly how can we even know what we are talking about?

[Dead Corpse]

By golly I think you finally got it...

Exceptions to the rule are enumerated restrictions on government power. If it isn't in their mandate, the Constitution, then they cannot pass a law regarding it. Period. If a Bill of Rights was added to the State's Constitution, or is already forbidden in the Federal Bill of Rights that are to be regarded as Common to ALL US citizens, then those actions are further restricted to all governing entities in that State. IE; your city council could not ban something that is explicitly spelled out in either the Federal or State Constitutions as being off limits.

Conflicts between enumerated powers, like the commerce clause and the Second Amendment, were to be handled by the USSC on a case by case basis.

At least, that was how the Founders tried to set things up. There has been a lot of "ignoring" going around in regards to governmental actions. If they want to do it, they will find a way to screw the public and still get elected.

[Know your rights]

it is within the powers of the states

I disagree. Since my adverse reaction to a nutritional supplement doesn't screw up other people's rights and liberties, it is not within the legitimate power of any government, including any state, to limit my liberty to take nutritional supplements.

[robertpaulsen]

"So since my adverse reaction to a nutritional supplement"

Ah. So this is about you. The laws should be structured for your good.

And the rest of us? The rest of society?

Sorry, I forgot. You're one of those libertarians who could give a FF about the rest of society. You just want to be left alone in your selfish, immoral, individualistic, and hedonistic little world.

Go find an island.

[Dead Corpse]

The caveat being of course unless they amend their State Constitution to give them said regulatory control. Not just pass a Law saying they can do it with no Constitutional backing.

[discostu]

I keep saying the same thing over and over because it's right and none of your "arguments" (which have now decended to the level of childish name calling, thus showing your own lack of confidence in them) have addressed any of those points.

I've said multiple times that this is outside the limitations of the federal government. But that doesn't mean vitamins are a right, it just means it's not the fed gov's business. Things that aren't the fed gov's business do not magically become rights.

I've got those concepts quite nicely in my forebrain. But you carefully ignore it when I say that because you want me to have a particular position, that being the only position you have a legitimate argument against. I've said many time, even in posts directly to YOU which you even responded to, that the federal government should NOT write this law because it's outside the athority given to the fed in the Constitution. What I'm arguing is that saying there's a right to take vitamins is foolish and weakens the definition of the word right. Fight the legislation where there's a legitimate argument: limitations of the fed gov in the Constitution. Not where there is no argument: making up rights that don't exist.

And until you actually read what I post and understand that I'm not supporting this legislation this isn't a discussion, it's just you being insulting and rude.

[Know your rights]

Adding sane and adult to it is just as much of a limitation as what I'm saying

Wrong. Limiting *who* *has* rights is different from limiting *what* *are* their rights.

[discostu]

I had it yesterday, you just finally read what I wrote instead of what you wanted to read.

[discostu]

Sorry but it is. No one is harmed if I correwctly use fireworks, and yet according to the state I live in I'm not even allowed to posses fireworks much less use them.

[Harmless Teddy Bear]

imminent=immigrant

Please pardon my error.

[Know your rights]

So since my adverse reaction to a nutritional supplement doesn't screw up other people's rights and liberties, there is no legitimate reason to "direct" my liberty to take nutritional supplements.

So this is about you.

Wrong. Since any person's adverse reaction to a nutritional supplement doesn't screw up other people's rights and liberties, there is no legitimate reason to "direct" any person's liberty to take nutritional supplements.

[discostu]

I agree that those limitations are legitimate, they are just as legitmate as understanding that those things that are a liberty are not a right. By pushing for everything that does no harm being a right you are in fact pushing to take sane and child off the limitation list. Unless a person's insanity poses a threat to others there's no rights problem there. Being young poses no threat to others so there's no rights problem there. If everything that doesn't hurt other people is a right then insane youth have just as many rights as everybody else. You want all or nothing, then have it. That is the system you are demanding, backing down now is raw hypocrise.

[Know your rights]

Since my adverse reaction to a nutritional supplement doesn't screw up other people's rights and liberties, it is not within the legitimate power of any government, including any state, to limit my liberty to take nutritional supplements.

Sorry but it is. No one is harmed if I correwctly use fireworks, and yet according to the state I live in I'm not even allowed to posses fireworks much less use them.

Fireworks can be argued to be a "clear and present danger" to other people's rights and liberties; nutritional supplements cannot. And just because a government does something does not prove that they have the legitimate power to do it.

[Know your rights]

By pushing for everything that does no harm being a right you are in fact pushing to take sane and child off the limitation list. [...] Being young poses no threat to others so there's no rights problem there.

Nobody's arguing that young people have no right to be young, so your point is irrelevant and your conclusion remains false.

[robertpaulsen]

"Or they wouldn't have needed the friggin' AMENDMENT now would they?"

If they didn't need a friggin' AMENDMENT in 1913, then why did they need a friggin' AMENDMENT in 1919, dip$hit?

[Know your rights]

unless they amend their State Constitution to give them said regulatory control

Actually, I'm talking about natural rights rather than legal rights.

[Dead Corpse]

You were so close. If you had just STOPPED with your previous post, we could have ended this on equitable terms.

You know those other "Rights" mentioned in the US Constitution? Those "The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people" type 9th Amendment Rights? Therein lies your Right to ingest vitamins. Now put the wording from the rest of the stuff we already agreed upon and you will see why I keep denigrating your position. You keep missing the godd*mn point.

[discostu]

You don't think that's what you're arguing for but you are. The same group of leftists that support everything being a right are the ones pushing for children's rights and the same group that thought Germany shouldn't have arrested the cannibal perve. Those are your compatriots in the battle to change the definition of right.

[discostu]

Ah but given that the nutritional suppliment industry has no oversight and you don't know what's in them, they even go so far as to tell the consumer they're not garaunteeing any of the results they promise, there CAN be harm to others in the production or sale of nutritional suppliments. And if it gets you all woozy and you crash your car into a school bus there's potential for harm to others too.

And in the case of fireworks any level of misuse that results in harm to others is already a crime, so if that's a legitimate reason for the state to ban something say goodbye to your guns and car.