|
You might say, it can't happen here! Our laws and legislation protect us.
Think again. Norway had a very viable health food industry just like the
United States. Today, after harmonization with European Economic Community
rules, one can no longer find vitamin C stronger than 250mg. The industry
lost numerous products and is almost non-existent. Those products once were
sold to people who looked after their own health, were educated in good
nutrition, and appreciated the products they could purchase. The products
were affordable, but now their prices are greatly inflated, and they are
available by prescription only.
Canadian government, driven by the pharmaceutical industry, ruled that
L-carnitine is salable by prescription only, along with all other amino
acids, and any herb that makes a health claim. L-carnitine is the only amino
acid that has received vitamin status because it is so important to the
heart. In fact whenever an autopsy is performed on a heart attack victim and
the heart tissue is measured for its levels of l-carnitine, it is always
low. How expensive is L-carnitine in Canada under prescription? It was $14
for a bottle of 100 capsules before the government legislation and is now
$120 to $190 by prescription only.
To its credit, Codex does work by consensus. This means that all voting
members must agree to a proposal before it is adopted. The problem is that
the vast majority of third world countries have little experience with a
US-like supplement market. Their government delegations, if not already in
the pocket of pharmaceutical interests, are easily swayed by the idea that
the Codex can supply them with a ready-made template of how to regulate
nutritional supplements. And what government official, even if of a
different and educated mind, will risk incurring trade sanctions against
important exports such as cotton or rice, to protect the right of its
citizens to high-potency vitamin E? With Codex regulating not only what can
be sold but also what can be said, these citizens will never know they need
vitamin E because they won't hear about its benefits! It's a denial to these
countries of access to safe, beneficial and inexpensive products.
One of the most important observations about the Codex Commission is that
it is a trade organization. Codex decisions mean big stakes for big
business! Ninety percent of the delegates represent large multinational
corporations. The Codex commission is comprised of entirely non-elected
officials from big government and bigger industry. (For instance, the US
voting delegate is an official from the FDA - definitely not an
"elected representative".) Worse still, industrial giants employ
lobbyists armed with arguments for establishing a favorable position that
represents their clients. These lobbyists are not registered as they are in
Canada and the United States. Also, there are no financial disclosure
statements as required by law in the United States and Canada. To repeat,
Codex decisions mean big stakes for big business! The meetings are a
bargaining platform by big business and lobbyists. This is the body that
will ultimately overrule and negate legislation in this country that
protects our rights to choice of health products.
What does the US voting delegate from the FDA
have to say regarding supplements?
Elizabeth Yetley, Ph.D., doesn't have a lot to say because she is not a
representative of an organization that advocates nutritional supplements. It
is not unlike having a car manufacturer represent the bicycle industry in
trade negotiations. This is a new field of endeavor for the FDA and it
should be demanded of them to proceed in a manner that recognizes the
tremendous benefits and value of the nutritional field and health food
supplement business. We already suffer from misdirection and inappropriate
judgment by the FDA as they proceed along their path to stop any health food
industry product that may compete with a pharmaceutical drug.
So here we have the FDA, our "voting representative" at the
Codex meetings, using their own brand of inferior science to advocate
restricting upper limits contrary to numerous good scientific studies. The
lobbyist and their employers are looking very hard to find anything that can
be construed as a reason to set these limits, which are considered
ridiculously low by American nutritional science.
Meanwhile, the pharmaceutical industry wants nutrients regulated with low
upper limits. In this way effective products will be available only through
doctors by prescription. When only doctors can prescribe them, as in
Germany, then insurance companies will be willing to pay for them and the
price tag can be enormously inflated. With insurance paying for them the
consumer will have little concern about prices because it will not come
directly out of his pocket. The high price will generate more profits and
wealth into the pharmaceutical industry. In this system, drugs can more
easily be promoted as the preferred treatment of choice. Most importantly,
the market for prescribed pharmaceuticals can now be greatly increased to
include healthy people trying to maintain their good health.
Herbs are a special target. They are very effective and there are many
traditional ways of preparing herbs. If the German Commission-E is
established as the Codex standard, all other methods of providing a good
herbal product for market will be eliminated. If herbs can suddenly be
considered dangerous, contrary to fact, then they will be banned from the
store shelves and made "prescription-only" products, as they are
in Germany.
I don't like to sound like George Orwell, but…
All of this is very ominous because the Codex commission is an outside
governing body determining American policy and public market availability of
products. The pharmaceutical industry and the banking system abroad are
closely aligned. This is a confluence of money and power. The pharmaceutical
industry's sales are over one trillion dollars a year, with an incredible
profit margin! This gives these international companies tremendous power to
buy public relations firms, press releases, television programming, and
newspaper and magazine articles. This wealth enables these companies to
effectively lobby the government and gain legislation that directs large
sums of money into their research projects and control the marketplace.
The FDA and the pharmaceutical giants are devising their own brand of
health protection. Propaganda-like machines are spewing out false stories.
For example, the vitamin C story in the LA Times (C causes hardening of the
arteries). Also, the Lehrer NewsHour report on a "new" way to take
vitamins (always ask your doctor- "yes, it's a good idea to take a
multiple"- "oh, beta carotene is dangerous"). Or CBS's
48-Hours Special on herb-drug interactions (it's not the handful of un-named
drugs she's taking that are dangerous, it must be the ginkgo). Each
commercial break features a pharmaceutical advertisement, urging consumers
to tell their doctors what to prescribe, i.e., you want that green and
purple pill, and oh yes, please note the following (bad) side effects.
When the Codex committee meets in Berlin, delegates advocating strict
controls and low upper limits to vitamins can point to the negative press
that herbs and vitamins are receiving in the United States. They can say,
it's time to control and restrict what is now available for you or me to
purchase here at home. Meanwhile, propaganda attacking nutrition will be
well financed and distributed everywhere. While in England I was amazed to
find the "Vitamin C causes hardening of the arteries" article,
that had been discredited, prevalent and accepted by people living there.
What is the true context of supplemental use?
Are supplements really necessary? Do we in this country have a special
situation? Is everyone in the world experiencing the same situation and at
the same time?
Much of what I read regarding the intentions of the Commission appears
narrow, restrictive and mindless of the vast differences in the nutritional
quality of each country's produce and other foods. One need only look at the
American experience, which is filled with experimentation, freedom of
opportunity and freedom of exploitation. Our wheat harvested in the early
1900s was nationally found to contain approximately 17% protein, i.e. amino
acid content. The wheat measured nationally in the 1960's had dropped
significantly to 12% protein.
In the AMA journals, as early as the 1950's there were recommendations
for multiple vitamins because of the dramatic decrease in the nutritional
levels of all grains, fruits, and vegetables due to increased acreage
production and the advent of chemical fertilizers. Europe had not yet
converted to industrial farming at that time, and so in comparison, while
America was the breadbox of the world, nutritionally we were coming up
short.
One area in particular was the dramatic decrease in niacin levels in corn
over the last eighty years. As corn production went up, the nutrient level
went down and niacin in particular was hard hit. As niacin levels dropped it
affected biological levels of l-tryptophan, and with that decline came less
serotonin production. As serotonin levels (which controls appetite) reduced,
over consumption increased and obesity became prevalent. This lack of
dietary niacin remains one of the many causes of obesity in the US.
Besides preventing deficiency diseases, supplementation is also necessary
to aid the body in protection against exposure to polychlorinated biphenyls
(PCBs) and other environmental chemicals. The presence of these chemicals is
overwhelming. Since 1999 the Environmental Protection Agency is screening
the impact of over 87,000 chemicals in commercial use for their impact on
the endocrine system along with over 50 environmental estrogens.
Perhaps some countries in the world don't have the same problems as we
do; perhaps some are not as aware of these problems. We know ways to
detoxify and protect living cells through nutrient supplementation. We can't
accept restrictions that may affect what we can purchase to help the
maintenance of health just because another country is unaware of our
particular problems. Neither should any other country be restricted from the
use of supplementation to protect themselves as they encounter such
overwhelming environmental problems. These problems are becoming worldwide,
and rather than setting artificial and needless upper limits, I think the
entire issues should be tabled. Let each country restrict and allow what it
now understands, and let the United States stand up for what has worked so
well for us.
A Call for Disinterested, Objective, and Honest Science
The science of supplementation is in its infancy both here and especially
in Europe and Third world countries. Let nutritional science continue to
develop for twenty or thirty more years as we begin to see the overwhelming
necessity to re-evaluate our direction regarding pharmaceutical drugs and
chemical poisons. And what of the "science" that has produced our
present crisis? The New England Journal of Medicine published a critique of
the US research system, saying science is being seriously compromised by the
growing influence of industry money
Breast cancer incidence has steadily climbed in the US, and has been
attributed to the accumulation of estrogenic chemicals in the environment.
Yet, in this country many people still think there is a cure for breast
cancer and are looking for magic bullets. Obviously, good nutrition along
with other good health practices is our best defense, but the real issue is
not the cure but the cause. The cause is readily obvious and glossed over
whenever possible by large corporations who not only produce chemicals and
pesticides that are producing estrogenic chemicals but have the audacity to
turn around and want to own and control the marketplace. Now they also want
to promote their pharmaceutical drugs as the only cure for the problems
created by the chemicals they manufacture. Even pharmaceutical drug residues
are showing up as a major new class of environmental pollution!
Harmonization Eliminates Context!
We, the people of the US, have lead the way in the science of
supplementation because our situation has required it and as an inventive
and free society we have faced the challenge. The Codex proposals do not
take into consideration the context of the situation, i.e. some countries
have a higher need for supplementation, some countries are better informed
about supplementation, some countries lead the way for developing
supplementation in a way that promotes and protects health.
What are the actual results of harmonization? In France the cheese
industry is told that now that international rules have been implemented and
accepted, French cheese must be refrigerated. The cheese merchants are
furious because their cheese loses all of its qualities when refrigerated
and in actuality the cheese is ruined. Furthermore, such cheeses as
Roquefort are prohibited from sale because of the presence of mold. Mold is
essential to that product and has beneficial qualities.
Blindness and Aids transmission have already been reduced by cheap and
simple vitamin A supplementation. So why should a UN agency issue rules and
regulations that restrict future possibilities? Individual countries must
keep their rights to make their own choices.
What are the alternatives to the present direction
of the Codex commission?
Since most countries at present rely on national policy rather than
nutritional scientists for the establishment of rules, and since much of the
"science" promoted at Codex by the European delegation is
politicized propaganda, there is no possibility of a reasonable agreement on
supplements. It appears that the best solution for the US is to protect its
own position, while actively seeking to educate interested nations in the
value and safety of nutritional supplements. Because the US is the vanguard
of nutritional supplements, we should use the Codex to host informational
sessions on nutritional supplementation, including the need for nutrients to
protect against environmental hazards and nutritional deficiencies. In
addition, much needs yet to be considered regarding specific scientific
data, its interpretation and use, and specifics of methodology.
|
