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Legislation 
The European Union is passing laws which will make it more difficult for us to take care of our own health in a manner we think best. "Consumer protection" is the apparent justification for taking away such "dangerous" things as herbs that have been used for millennia and vitamins or other nutrients that help us ward off disease. Two campaign sites for protecting our health freedom you might want to visit:
http://www.alliance-natural-health.org
http://www.laleva.cc
But trouble is brewing internationally - Europe is not alone. Codex Alimentarius, an international Food Standard Setting Body is after vitamins and minerals, discussing restrictive legislation. Canada, Australia, the USA are all on the same path.
Is there an international move (let's avoid the word 'conspiracy') to narrow down our alternative health options? You be the judge.
May 07, 2008
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On April 8th, Canada’s Minister of Health, Tony Clement, introduced Bill C-51 into the House of Commons. If passed, that bill will drastically alter the current Food and Drugs Act, and that will be bad news for many Canadians. According to an article on the Common Ground website, "expectations are that if Federal Bill C-51 is passed, around 75 percent of new applications will most likely fail to meet new requirements."
Canada has traditionally been liberal, favoring availability of nutrient-containing products to people wishing to use vitamins and minerals for their preventive or even curative health needs. But some time in the 90s, a world wide campaign was started to curtail the use of nutritional supplements in health care in favor of pharmaceutical medicines.
The US FDA's intention to limit vitamin dosages to RDA levels was blocked by an overwhelming consumer driven campaign which eventually resulted in liberal legislation, the so-called Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act (DSHEA) in 1993/94. In Europe, the early 90s saw the first attempt to pass a food supplements law, which after some delay was issued in 2004 as the Food Supplements Directive. Codex Alimentarius started talking about limiting supplements in 1994. More recently, Australia and New Zealand were supposed to harmonize in the direction of Australia's restrictive model which considers supplements "therapeutic goods" or medicines. New Zealand has successfully resisted so far. In Canada, there was resistance to change and finally a parliamentary committee was charged with finding a way to control supplements.
Shawn Buckley's Common Ground article gives some specifics on what happened before the introduction of the recent bill:
On November 4, 1998, the House of Commons Standing Committee on Health tabled its report, titled “Natural Health Products: A New Vision”. The report contained 53 recommendations, all of which were accepted by the Government on March 2, 1999. The first recommendation read that "Health Canada, in conjunction with a new separate Natural Health Products Expert Advisory Committee (EAC) should set out an appropriate definition of natural health products (NHPs) and amend the Food and Drugs Act accordingly." However, for expediency, a regulatory definition was created and implemeted instead of amending the law; Natural Health Products (NHPs) would be considered as drugs under the Food and Drugs Act. In Health Canada's page of Frequently Asked Questions, the following response was given for the question of why the Act was not amended:
"While creating another category distinct from both food and drugs was considered, an amendment at the level of the Act would have been necessary. Due to the timelines and legislative process required for a change of this magnitude, it was decided that natural health products would be considered drugs under the Act, but with a set of regulations specific to NHPs."
In effect, Health Canada is stating that they chose not to implement the direction of the government, but there was a good reason - amending the Act would take a long time and be a lot of work. However, on April 8, 2008, the Minister of Health introduced Bill C-51, An act to amend the Food and Drugs Act. This legislation introduces new definitions, including a new product category called "therapeutic products", a term that encompasses drugs, medical devices and cells used for therapeutic purposes. Despite there being an opportunity to amend the Act, an opportunity to amend definitions in the Act and include a decade-old Government directive to include Natural Health Products as a separate legal category, drafters of the bill chose not to. The question remains: why?
In effect, parliamentary deliberations were held in Canada and the results published, but the recommendations were disregarded. Did they simply not fit the broader agenda which commenced in the early 90s, of doing away with supplements as a competing approach to pharmaceuticals world wide in public health systems?
Continue reading "Canada: Bill C-51 threatens natural health products"
posted by Sepp Hasslberger on Wednesday May 7 2008
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April 03, 2008
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On 15 January, Reuters reported about a European scientific Committee report stating that Amalgams pose no health risk to the human nervous system.
Mercury vapor escaping from extracted tooth subjected to heat (from this video)
The report was prepared by the Scientific Committee on Emerging and Newly Identified Health Risks (SCENIHR) which is made up of external experts. According to Ulla Danielsen, a Danish journalist, the committee consists of seven members, four of which are dentists and have declared to have connections with the dental industry.
The report is available in PDF format from the EU Committe's website.
SCENIHR recognises that dental amalgam is an effective restorative material and, from the perspectives of longevity, the mechanical performance and health economics, may be considered the material of choice for some restorations in posterior teeth, including replacement therapy for existing amalgam fillings. However, because dental amalgam is neither tooth-coloured nor adhesive to remaining tooth tissues, its use has been decreasing in recent years and the alternative tooth-coloured filling materials have become increasingly more popular.
This rather upbeat assessment of mercury dental fillings however seems to be contradicted by what is generally known about the toxicity of the highly volatile metal, which the Committee acknowledges with the following words:
Mercury is the major metallic element used in dental amalgam. It is recognized that mercury in general does constitute a toxicological hazard, with reasonably well defined characteristics for the major forms of exposure, involving elemental mercury, organic and inorganic mercury compounds. It is accepted that the reduction in use of mercury in human activity would be beneficial both for the decrease in indirect human exposure and environmental considerations.
The report is clearly industry-friendly and - contrary to what the Committee's name would seem to indicate - is leaving the "emerging health risks" of mercury unexplored. This has led to protests by a number of scientists, medical doctors and associations including the French association "No to dental mercury", Vera Stejskal, Professor of Immunology at the University of Stockholm, Sweden, the International Academy of Oral Medicine & Toxicology, Dr. Joachim Mutter of the Institute for Environmental Medicine in Freiburg, Germany, the Swedish Chemicals Agency (KEM) and the European Academy for Environmental Medicine in Würzburg, Germany.
It also is worthy of note that the report appears to be completely out of tune with the European Commission's strategy to gradually eliminate mercury from the environment by reducing production and instituting strict controls on how mercury must be eliminated. The EU has a toxic hazards strategy to eliminate mercury, but according to the SCENIHR report there is nothing wrong with putting the poison in people's mouths. That just doesn't make any sense!
A public protest asking that the EU report be withdrawn and that a new expert group consisting of both competent and impartial experts be appointed to rewrite it, is available at the website of the Luxembourg based association AKUT.
You can sign the protest on this page.
Danish journalist Ulla Danielsen has more to say...
Continue reading "EU Scientific Committee: Mercury in dental fillings 'no danger'"
posted by Sepp Hasslberger on Thursday April 3 2008
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February 25, 2008
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The European Union does not believe in its citizens' ability to choose nutrients wisely. This very paternalistic view finds expression in a series of restrictive laws that aim at regulating what can be sold as a healthy food to supplement our daily menu with vitamins, minerals, herbs or vegetable concentrates.
The European Food Supplements Directive, which was approved in 2002, provides a "framework" for regulating the nutrients we may add to our meals. The details on coming restrictions for vitamins and minerals that the directive envisions have been delayed for years. Neither the lists of "nutrient sources" nor the dosages to be allowed in pills and capsules have been agreed, six years after the directive was first issued.
Yet the Commission is already busy on its next step. According to the Alliance for Natural Health, herbs and vegetable extracts are now in line for restrictive assessment. The alliance which represents consumers, doctors, shopkeepers and some producers is concerned that
large numbers of plant-derived products or botanicals, which pose no risk to human health, and have numerous benefits, will be forced through an onerous risk assessment procedure. The proposed procedure is likely to be cost-prohibitive for smaller companies that have been the main pioneers and innovators within the natural health industry.
Dr Robert Verkerk, executive director of the Alliance for Natural Health says that since our western diet more and more lacks the needed variety and we are not eating enough of the recommended vegetables and fruits, at least we should be able to supplement what we eat with more concentrated foods of high nutritional value. According to Verkerk, "botanical supplementation is an important tool for the enhancement of people’s diets. It makes no sense to limit freedom of choice for those who choose to take responsibility for their health.”
Some widely used natural essences such as eucalyptus, tea tree, thyme and citronella can no longer be used in natural insect repellents and personal deodorants, as a result of another European directive that regulates what are called "biocidal products". So the fear that many of the herbs and vegetable extracts we find today in food supplements are in jeopardy of being removed by heavy handed intervention is not just idle speculation.
If the Industry does not work to achieve a fairer regulatory regime, which accepts those botanical products that have been safely used for a long time, says Verkerk, a fate similar to these natural essences could befall many of the vegetable extracts that are used in food supplements today.
I might add that industry can do little without the backing of consumers. People who rely on these supplements to better the nutrient density of their foods better wake up as well and make their views known. The politicians seem so far removed from the reality of life today that they could make any law, as long as it helps Big Pharma, which they see as an important industry, and doesn't concern their own families directly. So wives, friends and children, clue in your politician husbands, friends and fathers ... (hint, hint)!
Continue reading "Will Europe Restrict Herbs, Vegetable Extracts?"
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