ANH General Eblast – 28th November 05

[Guest guest]

This month has seen the launch of the ANH Innovators Club and the

ANH Consultancy Ltd and we have been busy with the `in-house' work

that those initiatives have entailed, as well as the continuation of

work on key projects.

 

As part of our decision to work to build strategic alliances with

like-minded organizations, we have now aligned more formally with

the US-based, international National Health Federation. Dr Robert

Verkerk, our Executive & Scientific Director, has been invited on to

the Advisory Board of the National Heath Federation (NHF). The NHF

is the only international NGO (non-governmental organization) with

health freedom interests represented at Codex Alimentarius. This now

provides an important vehicle for providing inputs to Codex

committee meetings and electronic working groups – this represents

the first time that health freedom interests have had the facility

of working from the inside of Codex, rather than only from the

outside. More on this below.

 

As you know the ANH is always keen on any feedback that we receive

and we do our best to provide a swift and detailed response. One

question that has been raised by quite a few supporters over the

last month - and this is a long-standing health freedom `chestnut' –

is should we attack our opponents (namely pharmaceutical interests,

scientists and regulators who are hell bent on outlawing the use of

natural products in healthcare) head-on or should we fight a more a

tactical battle?

 

The ANH's positioning on this will remain unchanged. There are

health freedom groups that are attacking the system head-on, and, we

have strong relationships with a good many such groups. However, the

unique role that we can provide at the ANH is using scientific and

legal rationale and common sense to catalyse positive change. We are

trying to get a supertanker that is committed to the pharmaceutical-

model of healthcare to change direction and that is no short-term

undertaking. We see ourselves more as an expert `SWAT team' that

has come in to diffuse the bomb, rather than the mutineers that

throw grenades at their target, hoping for the best as they run in

the opposite direction. It's the difference between David

attempting to tackle Goliath head-on, or working tactically outside

his field of vision to bring him down. Our key tools are `good

science, good law'. We hope that the following inset will answer

this question for those of you who have asked it.

 

THE WAR AGAINST CODEX – Tactical planning or all out war?

 

The health freedom movement has three main options with regard to

Codex Guidelines on Vitamin and Mineral Food Supplements (VMFS) now

they have been agreed in principle. However they still have

elements within them like nutrient reference values (NRV's), health

claims and risk assessment that have yet to be finalised, and these

options (especially 2 and 3) are not necessarily mutually exclusive:

 

Option 1. Endorse the current Codex positions on food supplements in

every sense, merely dotting i's and crossing t's where necessary.

This is essentially where the course followed by the EU and US

delegations, as well as major trade associations such as the Council

for Responsible Nutrition (CRN), International Alliance for Dietary

Supplement Association (IADSA), and actually the vast majority of

delegates at Codex.

 

Option 2. Alternatively, you could choose to `abseil' into the Codex

system and try to effect, by working from the inside, fundamental

change in direction within key areas like risk assessment, NRVs and

health claims through Electronic Working Groups and by working with

a small (and hopefully growing) number of delegations and experts

who see the flaws in the existing approaches. This is one area in

which the National Health Federation (NHF) and the ANH is working.

You will see evidence of this approach in our recent press release.

 

 

Option 3. A third option is to work from outside of Codex to try to

bring to public and government attention to the problems with Codex.

Such an approach would aim at encouraging the US and other countries

to discourage or stop enforcement of guidelines (directly in

Congress/Parliaments or indirectly via blocking of harmonisation

treaties). This is where most health freedom organisations are,

including the ANH, NHF, the Coalition for Health Freedom and the

recently-established Natural Solutions Foundation. This base

position, which can have a thousand different configurations, can be

made to work in complement with option 2 above.

 

There are clearly other options, but in keeping with the ANH's

premise of `good science, good law', remaining in the land of

credible approaches that have at last a reasonable chance of success

seems ultimately more likely to yield results than attempting an all

out war. Goliath is more likely to win such a war than we are.

 

HEALTH CLAIMS

 

On the European stage, one of the biggest shocks of the last few

weeks has been the recently published Common Position of the

Nutrition & Health Claims Regulation. You might remember that this

is an EU regulation that allows limited claims to be made about

foods including food (dietary) supplements. It was thrown out of the

European Parliament because it was so problematic back in early

2004.

 

It then went through first reading again last July and the Common

Position (the result of negotiations between the European Commission

and the Council of Ministers) has just been released. Unfortunately,

some of the profound problems that affected this contentious

regulation back in 2004 are back in – and most surprisingly, a whole

raft of new text has appeared that has not been seen before, some of

it being very problematic! If you thought that EU law making was

democratic, you'd better think again!

 

We are in the process of developing a tight position paper on the

proposed regulation and are working on a variety of strategies to

help the European Parliament to have maximum possible influence on

it when the proposal goes to second reading in 2006. Watch this

space.

 

THE ANH INNOVATORS CLUB and THE ANH CONSULTANCY LTD

 

In less than three and a half years, the ANH has gained a high

profile, strong reputation and considerable influence with

legislators, the media, the healthcare industry as a whole and

consumers, enabling it to fight a campaign to protect natural

healthcare on an international scale. The ANH has consistently

shown it can punch well above its weight and has a proven track

record as a campaign organisation. We also have, within our Expert

Committees and as external consultants, some of the best scientific,

legal and marketing experts available in this field and we recognise

that we could be providing additional support to leading-edge

innovative manufacturers, formulators and suppliers who are most

severely impacted by current legislative pressure.

 

To this end the ANH Innovators Club has been launched, to provide

specific benefits in a tiered system of membership to this sector of

the natural healthcare industry.

 

We have also been consistently approached by this same sector of the

market for specific corporate assistance. As a not-for-profit

campaign organisation, the ANH has been unable to offer this type of

support up till now. To this end, we have just established ANH

Consultancy Ltd as a completely separate and independent entity to

the ANH. The ANH Consultancy allows leading-edge innovators to

avail themselves of the services of our Experts on a confidential,

project basis.

 

ANH on the move

 

17th November. Rob and Dr Damien Downing (ANH Medical Director)

attended and presented at the CANCERActive Conference in London,

England. Presenting were some of the leading orthodox, integrative

and alternate specialists in cancer treatment and prevention. Rob

and Damien were able to show how the `supplement blind-spot' common

to orthodox cancer treatment is costing the National Health Service

dearly and how altered lifestyles, good whole food and preferably

organic diets, as well as the use of unpatented natural products

hold the clue to cancer prevention.

 

21st – 25th November . Rob, as scientific advisor to the NHF,

attended the Codex Committee on Nutrition and Foods for Specific

Dietary Purposes session in Bonn, Germany. There is now much work

to do via the various electronic working groups to help bring about

a much more scientifically rational approach to risk assessment and

the development of internationally-recognised Nutrient Reference

Values.

 

We need your support – please help us to help

you! DONATE NOW

 

The ANH exists entirely on donations, the FSD being just the tip of

the iceberg we still need your full commitment to continue our

campaign. We are currently beginning a concerted drive to raise

funds for a second legal challenge, this time to EU medicinal law

(the HMPD).

 

Please consider making a monthly contribution to us, of whatever

amount you can afford. We are profoundly grateful for any support

that you can give us – and please send this e-blast on to friends

and contacts that might be interested in our work.

 

Your comments are always appreciated and noted and we'd be

interested in any feedback or suggestions.

 

In health,

 

Meleni

 

 

 

 

Meleni Aldridge

 

Operations & Communications Manager

ALLIANCE FOR NATURAL HEALTH

tel +44 (0)1252 371 275

fax +44 (0)1932 232202

 

Mob +44 (0)7771 750230

email mela

web www.alliance-natural-health.org