Help stop attempt to give FTC authority over nutritional supplements

[Guest guest]

Per the Alliance for Natural Health USA:

 

April 27, 2010

 

 

The American public is becoming fed up with " sneak " provisions tacked onto

largely unrelated bills that are likely to pass. A glaring recent example

was tacking onto the Healthcare bill a complete change to student loans.

Often the " sneak " provision is so buried that hardly anyone is aware of it.

 

 

The Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2009 (H.R. 4173),

recently passed in the House of Representatives, includes language going far

beyond finance inserted by Congressman Henry Waxman (D-CA). This language

could be used for an end run around the Dietary Supplement Health and

Education Act (DSHEA), the legislation that governs dietary supplement

regulation

by the FDA.

 

 

The Senate is expected to vote on its finance " reform " bill as early as

this weekend. We need your help to ensure that it is not amended to include a

similar provision going far beyond finance that could be used against

supplements. Please take action now. TAKE ACTION

 

 

Congressman Waxman is well known as an opponent of the dietary supplement

industry. This is somewhat ironic: his district includes Hollywood and

presumably many of his closest supporters are health store shoppers and

supplement users. Most of these people simply don't know what Waxman is doing in

this area.

 

 

This powerful Congressman, chair of the House Energy and Commerce

Committee (which includes health as a subcommittee)This powerful Congressman,

chair

of the House Energy and Commerce Committee (which includes health as a

subcommittee)<WBR>, would appear to want supplements regulated like drugs, a

step that would effectively eliminate

 

 

ANH-USA has been on alert to see how Waxman would use his committee

chairmanship to strike at DSHEA. He is very clever and we knew a covert attack

was a possibility.

 

 

A direct attack on supplements would take the form of an amendment to

DSHEA, since that legislation governs FDA regulation of supplements. In this

case, Waxman has left DSHEA alone, and has instead inserted language in the

Wall St. " reform " bill that gives the Federal Trade Commission (FTC)

important new powers that could be used to circumvent key supplement

protections in

DSHEA. TAKE ACTION

 

 

To see how this would work, let's see how the FTC operates today. Its

chief mission is to combat commercial fraud. It has full authority to pursue

companies making fraudulent claims. But the FTC can't go beyond that, can't

set other regulatory requirements, without advance approval of Congress. The

FTC once had this regulatory " rule-making " authority. It lost it in the

1980's because Congress thought the Agency was abusing it.

 

 

At the present time, if the FTC moves against a dietary supplement company

for false or misleading advertising, the FTC typically requires the

company, as part of a consent decree agreed to by both parties, to back up its

claims by undertaking at least two random controlled human trials. This is

done on a case-by-case basis and is legal because the targeted company has

agreed to it.

 

 

If the FTC had general rulemaking authority, which Waxman's language

reinstates, the Agency would be expected to create a new legal requirement for

all supplement companies. Such companies would have to perform at least two

of these human studies before making any claims for their products.

 

 

Why should we care whether supplement companies are required to perform

two random controlled human trials for each product? Because such trials take

a long time and would be beyond the financial means of most supplement

companies. Even if the companies could find the money, the FTC could require

more and more costly versions of these studies, or more of these studies. At

each stage, fewer supplements would be available, and those available would

cost more and more, until they became as costly as drugs.

 

 

TAKE ACTION -

 

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Supplements are not drugs. In most cases, drugs are non-natural and

therefore patentable substances. Why patentable? Because no company will spend

a

billion dollars on studies and FDA approval trials without the monopoly

provided by the patent.

 

 

To insist that supplements be treated like drugs is really to sound the

death knell for the supplement industry, something that drug companies would

be delighted to see, because they know that supplements are their chief

potential competition, are often more effective than drugs, are often less

toxic, and are always much less expensive.

 

 

Supplements are already regulated by the FDA under DSHEA. If the Waxman

provision is included in the final Wall St " reform " bill, the FTC will gain

the power to override the limited protections for supplements that already

exist under DSHEA. The FDA would still have to respect DSHEA, but the FTC

would not be so constrained.

 

 

Five unelected FTC commissioners would issue binding regulations in a wide

range of areas, including the regulation of dietary supplements. And

companies that did not comply with the new FTC rules could effectively be put

out of business.

 

 

According to renowned constitutional attorney Jonathan Emord, " The

provision removing the ban on FTC rulemaking without Congressional preapproval

contained in H.R. 4173 invites the very same irresponsible over-regulation of

the commercial marketplace that led Congress to enact the ban in the 1980s.

FTC has no shortage of power to regulate deceptive advertising; this bill

gives it far more discretionary power than it needs, inviting greater abuse

and mischief from an agency that suffers virtually no check on its

discretion. "

 

 

The bottom line is that FTC would be given power to regulate areas they

don't understand, and their first order of business would likely be to

regulate supplements, an area far outside their area of expertise.

 

 

The Senate Wall St " reform " bill, the Restoring American Financial

Stability Act of 2010 (S. 3217), doesn't contain the Waxman provision yet. But

we

know that Senator Rockefeller (D-WV) may offer an amendment including

Waxman's language.

 

 

Please help us stop this. Please take action now to help us maintain

access to low cost, high quality supplements. Tell your senators not to support

any amendments that give FTC unchecked power to over-regulate areas they

don't understand, including dietary supplements.

 

 

Thanks to the Alliance for Natural Health USA for this vital information:

 

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