More on the Action against Supplements

Regulate Supplements Like Drugs!”: Senator Durbin on NPR
November 19, 2013


In just under five minutes, he reveals his plan, which would effectively eliminate supplements from the shelves. Action Alert!

We’ve told you before about Sen. Dick Durbin’s (D-IL) Dietary Supplement Labeling Act. Recently, he went on National Public Radio’s Science Friday to drum up support for this dishonest bill.

Sen. Durbin’s strategy has been to paint the dietary supplement industry as under-regulated and over-influential, blocking small, reasonable regulatory changes that would protect vulnerable consumers. (This, of course, is patently false, as we’ve proven over and over.) Don’t be deceived by the spin. The proposed changes are neither small nor reasonable.

The NPR interview was important because the senator came out of the shadows to speak on the record. By doing so, he demonstrated his fundamental (or perhaps willful) lack of understanding about the natural health industry, dietary supplements, their regulation, and even his own legislation. He also fully revealed his intentions for nutritional supplements—that they be regulated like drugs!

Continue:
[www.anh-usa.org]

Integrative Cardiologist, Stephen Sinatra, MD weighs in on this topic:

Dr. Sinatra's News Alert - Protect Your Access to Supplements!

Dear HMDI Member,

As you know, I zealously advocate nutritional supplementation as part of a heart-healthy lifestyle. As with sticking to an anti-inflammatory diet, regularly engaging in moderate exercise, managing stress through mind-body practices, and minimizing toxic assault in the body, supplementation is something we all have in our individual health “toolboxes.”

However, I’m concerned that our access to affordable supplements may be severely limited if a new bill (S. 1425, The Dietary Supplement Labeling Act) that Illinois Senator Dick Durbin recently introduced into Congress passes. As the Alliance for Natural Health (ANH-USA) states in this Action Alert and related article on the matter, Senator Durbin’s new bill “will lead inexorably to pre-approval for supplements—and that will cost so much that most supplements will disappear… If Sen. Durbin gets his way, most dietary supplement companies would be put out of business, clearing the way for Big Pharma to take over with their synthetic versions of the same products—at prescription prices.”

“Moreover,” continues ANH-USA, “almost all of the bill’s other provisions are already covered by existing law. There is no need for any new legislation, especially with the vague language in this bill; the only need is for existing laws to be fully enforced.”

If you care about being able to continue your access to supplements, I highly encourage you to read this ANH-USA article and to take action by signing and sending to your Senators this letter that ANH-USA has drafted (you can edit it as you see fit).

As ANH-USA points out in the article, “It was consumer-activists like you that sent over 100,000 messages to Congress to defeat [Sen. Durbin’s] 2012 anti-supplement amendment (the 2012 amendment is—verbatim—the same Labeling Bill he’s pushing now).”

Our democracy is founded upon the principle that our individual voices matter – we just have to make them heard.

From my heart to yours,

Stephen Sinatra, MD.