McCain And I Agree? On New Regulations, No Less? The Government Should Regulate Supplements.

One of the great ironies of heavily over-regulated, overlawyered, and over-nannied society is that the makers of dietary supplements are allowed to make wild, completely unsupportable claims about their products while the government sits around with their thumbs up their behinds.

I’m not going to sit here and tell you that people selling Yohimbe and Ginkgo Biloba should have to go through the sort of rigorous process that makers of Prozac do, but these companies are making billions off of products that do absolutely nothing. 95% of the supplements you run across at your local Wal-Mart, GNC, drug store, etc. have never been scientifically proven to do anything for anyone.

So, I do agree with McCain that is one area where there needs to be more government regulation:

Senator John McCain has proposed the Dietary Supplement Safety Act, S. 3002, that would give the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) the power to restrict the sale of vitamin supplements, minerals, and herbs. This bill would repeal key provisions of the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act (DSHEA) which currently treats these products as food.

I received an email from a liberal group asking me to email my representatives to oppose this legislation because it will hurt people who rely on vitamin supplements and herbal products rather than using drugs produced by pharmaceutical companies. A link from the liberal group’s web page took me to JBS.org where I could read a lengthy explanation of how McCain’s bill would restrict the rights of Americans. I read through this web page and then clicked the “about” link to see whose web page I was reading. JBS.org is the web page of……The John Birch Society!

It’s not the government’s job to pick winners and losers in the marketplace, but they do have a responsibility to play the role of an umpire, to insure that Americans aren’t being lied to about the products they’re being sold. So, when millions of Americans are paying billions of dollars for products that do nothing for them, I think it’s time for the government to step up to the plate.

Share this!

Enjoy reading? Share it with your friends!