Anti-Supplement Congressmen At It Again & Other Important Legislation
Consumer Action Needed To Amend the FDA Globalization Act of 2008
Contact Your Congressional Representatives Now
[It is critical that consumers push to amend this proposed bill to exempt its application to dietary supplements, or there will be more regulation, higher costs for supplement manufacturers (domestic and foreign), and higher costs for consumers.]
The FDA Globalization Act – Higher Costs for Supplements
By Lee Bechtel, NHF National Lobbyist
The Kennedy/Durbin/Dingell/Waxman, pro-FDA/anti-supplement axis does not rest.
Now, Representative John Dingell (D-MI), Chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, has released draft legislation that would institute new yearly Food and Drug Administration (FDA) user fees for domestic and foreign dietary-supplement manufacturers. The proposed bill, the FDA Globalization Act, does not exempt supplements from inclusion and classification as food products or ingredients. Sound familiar as a legislative strategy for the Democratic-controlled Congress and their anti-supplement leaders?
The draft bill's provisions also give the FDA one-sided legal authority to recall contaminated "foods" and "unsafe medications." Currently, the Agency can only ask companies to withdraw a supplement product it deems to be a drug, an adulterated food, or unsafe for consumers. This new legislation would establish a group of inspectors to monitor companies that manufacture nutritional foods, supplements, drugs, and medical devices abroad. To fund these changes, and to pay for the expansion of FDA authority, the bill creates new FDA user fees for domestic and foreign manufacturers. Foreign companies importing supplements for distribution within the U.S. would also be required to register their products and production facilities with the FDA every year, and to pay a user fee.
The draft bill has not yet been officially introduced, so it has no bill number yet. It takes provisions from several bills already introduced – H.R.3610, H.R.3624, H.R.3115, and H.R.3484. If passed and enacted into law in its current version, the legislation would no doubt lead to more FDA regulation of supplements, higher costs for supplement manufacturers, domestic and foreign, and these higher costs would in turn be passed on to consumers of dietary supplements.
Health-freedom advocates and NHF members need to contact their Congressmen and –women, and especially Energy and Commerce Committee members, to amend this proposed bill to specifically exempt its application to dietary supplements. If this does not happen, it would be left to the FDA to interpret its application or non-application to supplements. Health-freedom advocates already know what has and can happen if this were to occur.
Supplements already have an enviable track record of incredible safety, they neither deserve nor need yet another layer of bureaucratic control. Above all, this attempt – yet again – to lump safe supplements into the same category as dangerous drugs must be defeated.
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Additional Information on the FDA Globalization Act- (Click this link)
To Read Representative John Dingell's Memo- (Click this link)
To View the Sample Petition Letter- (Click this link)
Committee on Energy and Commerce Members (Click this link)
NHF members and the health freedom community in general, must get behind our lobbying efforts to obtain clarification/exemption language included in the Globalization legislation.
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Click on this address to contact your Congressperson
in the U.S. House of Representatives: http://www.house.gov/writerep
Click on the following links below for individual mailing addresses for
letter writing and other contact info for Congress Members:
House of Representatives
Fax List for Congress
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Website: www.thenhf.com E-mail: contact-us@thenhf.com
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