To: IAHF List
Subject: "Consumer Lab" Delists Product for Exceeding "Safe Upper Levels" IAHF Challenges Their Unscientific Decision
From: "International Advocates for Health Freedom" jham@iahf.com
Date: Mon, 29 Jan 2001 21:14:33 -0500

IAHF Webmaster: Post this under Breaking News, Codex Oversight, Create a new section underneath "Vitamin Trade Assoc's Xposed" and call it "Consumerlab Xposed" Also, put Leibovitz article at http://www.iahf.com/leibovitz/jon.html#confuse under NAS Rebuttal Section. Should be in there.

IAHF List: Please read consumer labs press release below about their "delisting" a formerly "approved" Glucosamine and Chondroitin product due to its containing more than the accepted (utterly unscientific) "UL" or "Safe Upper Level" of Manganese (11 mg for adults), and please see my open letter to Consumer Lab below their press release. The UL concept is as scientifically fraudulent as the "RDA", but "Consumer Lab" would have us believe otherwise, and the media eats up their unscientific pronouncements, spewing this pro Cartel drivel everywhere as an incessant drumbeat of pure propaganda.

Interesting how "Consumer Lab" was started by people who used to work at FDA, and its even more interesting how they have massive media coverage for their reports from mainstream newspapers... (see list at http://www.consumerlab.com Their press releases lend credence to bogus scientific concepts such as the "UL" and scare consumers away from safe dietary supplements which benefits pharmaceutical interests and conditions members of Congress towards the Cartels' goal of harmonizing our vitamin regs to grossly restrictive EU and Codex regulations. First, they have to engage in Hitler's "Big Lie" technique (if you want someone to believe something, tell a REALLY BIG LIE and repeat it often. The Big Lie is that we "need" a "Safe Upper Level" for already very safe substances, while pharmaceutical prescription drugs consitute the world's third leading cause of death.)

After you read Consumer Lab's outrageous, grossly unscientific press release, and my open letter to them (below it)

To Stop the EU Vitamin Directive and Codex, please sign the petitions at http://www.garynull.com/ and at http://www.laleva.org/petizione/english/intro_eng.html

No need to fear any repeat of the pharmaceutical hack attack that occurred on the weekend against our petition. See the announcement at http://www.ikaro.net (ISP of La Leva website) Its safe to go back and sign and tell your friends. We can't let any gutless pharmaceutical hack attacks scare us from fighting for our right to ingest whatever we wish into our own bodies. We, and NOT the state, are sovereign over our own bodies, and the PIC (Pharmaceutical Industrial Complex) their regulatory stooges, and corrupt politicians can take a long walk..... off a short pier.

CONSUMER LAB's PRESS RELEASE and MY OPEN LETTER TO CONSUMER LAB FOLLOW

ConsumerLab.com - http://www.consumerlab.com/

Dear ConsumerLab.com Mail List Member:

On January 9, 2001 the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies issued recommendations which have led ConsumerLab.com to de-list one product from its Approved Quality Glucosamine & Chondroitin Products list. The new recommendations state a Tolerable Upper Intake Level (UL) for manganese at 11 milligrams per day for adults. Some glucosamine and chondroitin products, such as the one de-listed, contain manganese at levels that exceed this UL. For more information see the Product Review Update above the list of Approved Quality Glucosamine and Chondroitin Products at http://www.consumerlab.com/results/gluco.html#update and the January 29, 2001 News Release from ConsumerLab.com (at http://www.consumerlab.com/news/news_012901.html).

Also, CL's Multivitamin/Multimineral Product Review will be released shortly. Its release was delayed in order to incorporate the latest recommendations on daily intakes for the ingredients in these products. You will be notified when it is available.

Sincerely,

The Staff of ConsumerLab.com

Dear Consumer Lab:

"Manganese is depleted in the soil by modern farming methods and food processing practices so people are often deficient. In oral doses, manganese is never harmful, although in patients older than 40, it has occassionally elevated blood pressure. The elevated pressure returns to normal when zinc is administered, however." (Carl C. Pfeiffer, MD,PhD, "Mental and Elemental Nutrients" pp.255-257 Keats Publishing, New Caanan CT, '75)

The "Safe Upper Limit" concept for vitamins is totally fraudulent, and there is zero scientific justifacation for you "delisting" a product from your "approved" list just because it contains more than 11mg/day of manganese. The National Academy of Sciences is hardly an objective group, they're hopelessly mired in conflict of interest with most of their funding, and most of the funding of the authors of their papers coming from pharmaceutical research grants. Moreover, since they're not part of the government, they're not subject to the Freedom of Information Act, so nothing they say can be trusted since you can't get the raw data behind any of their papers, or the CV's of their authors. Meanwhile, Congress is awash in pharmaceutical PAC money, so they're not about to provide us with proper oversight that would expose this charade, and the will of the people be damned.

Any substance, even WATER becomes toxic at SOME level, but NAS hasn't created a "UL" on water, now have they? Drink too much water and it will burst your stomach wall and you will die, but since it doesn't compete in the marketplace with any pharmaceutical drugs, NAS (which is hopeless caught in a conflict of interest with pharmaceutical money being behind most of their research grants) will never create a "UL" for water....because there is no advantage to them to try to arbitrarily restrict its intake.

The late Brian Leibovitz, PhD, former Editor of the Journal of Applied Nutrition, wrote an excellent editorial that I urge you to read about the fraudulence of all these ludicrous allegedly "scientific" acronyms the NAS is coming out with. Nothing based on the fraudulent RDA has any validity whatsoever, and the so called "UL" is no exception. See Leibovitz article "The ABC's of Confusion as a Weapon" at http://www.iahf.com/leibovitz/jon.html#confuse

For additional information on the scientific fraudulence of the pharmaceutically funded so called "National Academy of Science" see "A Critical Analysis of The National Academy of Sciences' Attack on Dietary Supplements" by William Faloon of the Life Extension Foundation at http://www.lef.org/featured-articles/may2000_canasads_01.html

Also see Dr.Richard Malter's Rebuttal to the NAS paper "A Risk Assessment Model for Establishing Safe Upper Levels for Nutrients" at http://www.iahf.com (See NAS Paper and Rebuttal)

Consumer Lab: After reading these articles, please explain if you think you are still justified in taking this action to "delist" a product from your "Approved" list just because it contains more than the so called "UL" for manganese? In the face of this evidence to the contrary, how do you justify the "Safe Upper Level" concept for safe dietary supplements?

Any lack of response on the part of Consumer Lab will be taken to mean that you have nothing to say, and that I am debating an empty chair. The IAHF website receives an average of over 3,000 unique visitors per day from all over the world, so if you have anything to rebut this with, speak now, or forever hold your peace. If you rebut this, IAHF will post your rebuttal. Otherwise, you've got egg all over your face. Its your choice. Perhaps with all the support you get from the CIA dominated mainstream press, you don't care what IAHF thinks, but I am giving you a chance to respond.

For Health Freedom,
John Hammell
International Advocates for Health Freedom
http://www.iahf.com