Return-Path: jham@concentric.net Errors-To: Date: Wed, 17 Dec 1997 17:42:32 -0500 (EST) X-Sender: jham@pop3.concentric.net To: crosswinds@roadrunner.com From: John Hammell Subject: Inaccuracies Exposed in Article "The Assault on Natural Medicine- The Rumor and the Reality" A letter to the Editor of Crosswinds Newspaper To Steve Lawrence, Editor: I am writing with regards to Catherine Coggan's article "The Assault on Natural Medicine- The Rumor and the Reality" which appeared in the December issue of Crosswinds. Carole Tashel, one of your readers in New Mexico sent me a copy in the mail, requesting that I write to you in order to address a number of inaccuracies in the article. I am sending this not only to you, but to a distribution list of several thousand people for educational purposes due to the fact that a number of articles such as Coggan's have been published recently in several different publications containing the same bad information, culled from the same biased sources. Coggan's article is not accurately researched, although to many editors it would SEEM to be. In reality, she is skimming the surface of the issue. I only know this because I have earned a living defending consumer access to natural products for the past 10 years, so am immersed in all aspects of this matter on a daily basis. In October of last year I was on the American Codex Delegation at a meeting of the Committee on Nutrition and Foods for Special Dietary Use in Bonn, Germany. Last month I spent 3 weeks in Washington as part of a successful lobbying campaign which I led to get dietary supplements specifically exempted from the harmonization language in the Food and Drug Administration Modernization Act of 1997 (the "FDA Reform Bill.") I was just recognized through an award presented by the American Preventive Medical Association for my successful efforts to amend the FDA Reform Bill in order to defend consumer access to dietary supplements. The article I wrote about this effort will be published in the February issue of Life Extension Magazine, and can be viewed on my website at http://www.pnc.com.au/~cafmr/hammell/s830vict.html In addition to writing for Life Extension Magazine, I have formed a consulting firm which interracts with health freedom fighters from several countries around the world.(See website) Although the message someone circulated on the internet stating that the US "had only 10 days to act before the Codex regulations became law in this country" was somewhat inaccurate- it was not NEARLY as inaccurate as Coggan stated in her article, but she hasn't studied the issues well enough to make any sort of fine distinctions. When my efforts to sound an international alarm caused the German Codex proposal to be knocked back to step 3 from step 5 in Geneva in June, (hampering their efforts at the international level), the pharmaceutical lobby redoubled their efforts at the NATIONAL level world wide, working to try to achieve their objectives through such legislation as the FDA Reform Bill. Suzanne Harris,JD attended a WTO meeting of the committee on Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures while she was in Geneva for the Codex meeting last June, and she heard them discussing their plans to do this. If we had not amended the FDA Reform Bill (which the 10 day warning message was about), our food and drug law would have been harmonized with that of the EU, where supplements are regulated as "drugs" and where they are moving in the direction of very restrictive maximum potency levels which mirror the German Codex proposal. The only two countries currently opposing the EU move towards maximum potency levels are the UK and Holland. In an ANPR published in the July 7, 1997 Federal Register, Vol.62, #129 pp.36243-36248, by sleight of hand the FDA is attempting to give even more power to the Codex Commission than even the most expansive reading of our current agreements would warrant-- but Catherine Coggan hasn't read this, so she has no problem believing what she is told by Citizens for Health, and others such as Karl Reidel of NNFA, who also hasn't done any sort of in depth analysis of what is unfolding. When I challenged CFH to produce the comments they had presumably sent to the FDA by the comments deadline for their ANPR of July 7th, they produced nothing. NNFA also failed to challenge this ANPR. Anyone reading my article at http://www.pnc.com.au/~cafmr/hammell/s830vict.html will more readily grasp this, and I would also strongly recommend that you procure either the audio or video tapes from the Health Action Network Society's 3rd Public Forum held in Vancouver, BC, Canada on September 28, 1997- featuring Suzanne Harris,JD, Dr.Michele Brill-Edwards, MD. Harris's discussion of the world wide takeover campaign is very heavily documented, with documents culled from the World Health Organization library and other key sources and Brill-Edwards defected from the HPB due to the corruption which she is now exposing. Order these tapes, or a transcript by calling HANS in Burnaby, BC, Canada at 604-435-1561. While discussing allegedly wildly inaccurate internet rumors, Coggan correctly states that the Codex commission is not studying herbs-- but does she realize that this is only due to the fact that I generated sufficient international opposition to a Canadian Codex proposal to create a negative, or "no trade" list of herbs which pharmaceutical interests wanted to ban from international commerce that we pressured the withdrawal of this motion? My colleague Suzanne Harris observed this at the last Codex meeting in Geneva in June of this year, and I first brought the issue up after reporting on what happened in Bonn (see my website for my Report from Bonn.) Also, under the German Codex proposal, any nutrient that doesn't have an RDA would automatically be regulated as a "drug"-- so Coggan's assertions that people's concerns on the internet were wildly inaccurate, are themselves inaccurate. Herbs don't have RDA's. Neither do a lot of other natural substances which are widely available in American health food stores, but which are regulated as "drugs" in Germany and in most other countries where many products are not available at all, except on the black market. Canada is a perfect example. Over 160 safe natural products that are not available in Canadian health food stores are available in American health food stores. (See the article "HPB Protects the Pharmaceutical Industry- Harms the Public" by Zoltan P. Rona, MD, M.Sc. at www.pnc.com.au/~cafmr/hammell/hpb-aug.html Dr.Rona is an orthomolecular physician practicing in Toronto, Ontario. He has a much better grasp of what is happening in Canada than Corola Burczak does. (Coggan cites Burczak as an alleged "expert" on what is happening in Canada.) Burczak doesn't think the DIN system in Canada has anything to do with a world wide campaign by the pharmaceutical industry, but she has no basis on which to make this assertion. While it is true that the move to a DIN system is a revenue grabbing scheme for Health Canada, as Burczak states, it is ALSO true that the software used by the HPB to implement the DIN system was brought to Canada from Australia, by Sam Wong of the Australian TGA (Therapeutic Goods Administration), and it is ALSO true that a move is afoot world wide to try to impose the DIN system in other countries. I am working with health freedom activists in S.Africa, New Zealand, the UK and elsewhere who are all combatting this system. With current efforts underway to create a special panel at FDA for the review of OTC drug claims on herbs, we will have to be vigilant to insure that a DIN system isn't imposed on the United States. Burczak and Coggan should be aware that there is coordination between FDA, HPB, MCC, MCA, TGA, and other counterparts via the UN's International Council on Drug Regulating Authorities, which serves as an umbrella organization. Due to the fact that the FDA is closely networked with their international counterparts, I formed IAHF so that consumers around the world could compare notes in order to know best how to fight back. Perhaps unwittingly, and through no fault of her own, Coggan has fallen prey to a disinformation campaign which is being orchestrated by Citizens for Health, a fake grass roots organization headquartered in Boulder, Colorado. CFH is being influenced heavily by a number of herb companies which are currently pushing hard for the FDA to establish a botanical review board which would review over the counter (OTC) drug claims for herbs, when therapeutic claims are made that go beyond the structure-function claims allowed under the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act of 1994. See the Final Report of the Commission on Dietary Supplement Labels at http://www.health.gov/dietsupp/ Smaller herb and vitamin companies won't be able to afford the costs involved with OTC drug manufacturing, and this will create an unlevel playing field as the hurdles are raised. Adding to this problem will be the new Good Manufacturing Practice Regulations (GMPs) that the FDA will be unleashing on the supplement industry this spring. In an ANPR (Advance Notice of Proposed Rulemaking) published in the Federal Register on February 6th, 1997 (Vol. 62, #25, 21 CFR Ch.1, Docket Number 96N-0417, RIN 0910-AA59 "Current Good Manufacturing Practices, Packing, or Holding Dietary Supplements, the FDA announced that they will be coming out with HACCP regulations (Hazard Anaylsis and Critical Control Point)- the same sort of GMPs currently required by the Food and also by the Pharmaceutical Industries. While this type of GMPs are required for these industries due to the comparatively large number of deaths and illnesses attributed every year to both contaminated food, and to overdoses of drugs, to force these type of overly stringent GMPs on the supplement industry constitutes gross bureaucratic overkill. Anyone can readily discern the safety of dietary supplements and herbs by calling the American Association of Poison Control Centers in Washington and looking at their documentation. Although the larger herb and vitamin companies will be able to absorb the costs involved with these new GMPs, many of their smaller competitors won't be able to, and consumers will be forced to pay higher prices. The larger companies, which will be able to afford the costs involved with OTC drug manufacturing, will gain an unfair market advantage through being able to make therapeutic claims. In time, they will be able to drive many of their smaller competitors out of business. The resulting lack of competition will force prices up. It is not to CFH's advantage if consumers get stirred up and start looking closely at what is unfolding because that would anger some of their largest supporters-- companies with a vested interest to protect. While I was in Washington, actively working to defend consumer access to dietary supplements, so called "Citizens for Health" was actively faxing spin control to members of Congress in an active effort to oppose my message. Why would they do this? The reason is that they have support from some large herb companies that would have BENEFITTED if the harmonization language in the FDA Reform Bill had NOT been amended! If it had NOT been amended to exempt dietary supplements, American food and drug law would have been "harmonized" with that of the EU, where supplements are regulated as drugs. The term "harmonization" comes to us from trade law, and means to "make the same as". By harmonizing our laws, we wouldn't just be making them "compatible" with other countries, we'd be making them identical. To counter CFH's spin control which was pouring into Washington while I was there trying to defend health freedom, Suzanne Harris wrote an article which you can download from my website titled "S.830- Asking the Right Questions, Getting the Right Answers" American herb companies which have formed partnerships with German phytopharmaceutical companies which seek to enter the lucrative and largely undeveloped N.American market would have enjoyed a huge market advantage if I had NOT succeeded in my efforts. The German effort to dominate the N.American market is discussed in the April 15th issue of Genetic Engineering News. For a reprint call 914-834-3100 ext.609 I first became aware of the threat posed by the harmonization language in the FDA Reform bill in the middle of August, and sounded the alarm to the rest of the health movement, including to Citizens for Health. They didn't act until they were pressured to by a lot of their members who had learned of the threat from me, and when they did act, they didn't send anyone to Capital Hill to lobby with me, and they didn't know which members of Congress most needed to be approached. To make it SEEM as if they were doing something, they urged people to call Senators Hatch and Harkin's offices, however neither of them had the power to change the harmonization language. The ONLY person who could do that was Senator Gregg of New Hampshire, because he was the one who drafted it in the first place. There is a shadowy lobby group called the European-American Phytomedicines Coalition which wants very much to invade the N.American market in order to dominate the sale of herbal products. There are some companies in the United States that are allied with them, and it is VERY important for you (and for Catherine Coggan) to realize that vitamin trade associations, and industry front groups such as Citizens for Health, do NOT speak for consumers! I do, however. Anyone can be added to my email distribution list by sending me email with "ADD" in the subject line. I value everyone's input, and urge you to assist me in opposing the agenda of the European-American Phytomedicines Coalition by assisting us in getting cosponsors on HR 2868- The Consumer Health Free Speech Act, which was just introduced by Ron Paul. You can download a form letter off my website which explains more fully. This very simple one page bill will allow us to do what we should be able to do right now: to make therapeutic claims on dietary supplements as classed as foods. From a standpoint of emerging international law, it is a serious mistake to facilitate the making of OTC drug claims on herbs. Herbs are foods, not drugs. Anyone who tells you that there is no international effort by the pharmaceutical industry to take over and dominate our natural products industry is either engaging in disinformation, or they are very naive. The only reason the German Codex proposal was knocked back to step 3 when they tried to advance it to step 6, and the only reason the Canadian motion to create the negative or "no trade list" for herbs was shot down was due to my successful efforts to sound an international alarm. Much of this effort has been done via the internet, although I did do a lot of public speaking in Canada. My efforts to interface with the Canadian health freedom groups Citizens Voice for Health Rights, and Freedom of Choice in Health Care enabled Canadians to drive former Health Minister David Dingwall out of office, and it enabled the Reform Party to gain official opposition status, putting quite a scare into the ruling Liberal Party. In the future, if you ever need any information on these issues, feel free to contact me. I hope this information has been helpful to you. Please print this letter in order to offset the misinformation contained within Coggan's article, and please email it to me. -John Hammell ****************************************** Donations Needed- Need Help to Keep Helper On International Advocates for Health Freedom John C. Hammell, Legislative Advocate 2411 Monroe St.#2 Hollywood, FL 33020 USA 800-333-2553, 954-929-2905, FAX 954-929-0507, FAX ON DEMAND 954-927-8795,jham@concentric.net http://www.pnc.com.au/~cafmr/hammell/index.html