statism watch

Martin Mittelstaedt, Globe and Mail
October 30, 2008

Health Minister Tony Clement plans to reintroduce controversial legislation giving the federal government more oversight regarding the quality and safety of supplements, vitamins and other natural health products.

A spokeswoman for the minister, Laryssa Waler, said yesterday that Ottawa intends to go forward with new safety proposals to cover the booming and poorly regulated supplement field, but didn’t offer a timeline.

The decision is likely to cause another pitched battle within the natural health products industry, where one major player, Jamieson Laboratories, yesterday issued a public call for stricter regulations.

It argues that current rules are so lax that Ottawa can’t even order harmful products off store shelves and is only able to issue toothless health advisories.

The earlier legislation, known as bill C-51, prompted a vociferous campaign by some smaller health-products companies that said it would lead to government restrictions on the types of supplements available on the market. The bill died when the election was called.

Jamieson had supported the previously proposed law and said that even tougher standards were needed to protect public health from tainted materials in supplements.

The pressing need for more oversight was highlighted on Tuesday when Health Canada issued an advisory saying that a company inadvertently sold a product labelled as containing vitamin C that was improperly manufactured using vitamin A instead. The products were sold under the brand names of New Roots Herbal Vitamin C8 and Vitazan Professional Vitamin C Advanced Ascorbate.

Health Canada warned the pills may contain high doses of vitamin A, exposing users “to potential risks of adverse events.” It urged consumers, particularly pregnant women, not to use them.

The warning is the latest in a long string of advisories Health Canada has made during the past two years over undeclared drugs, heavy metals and steroid hormones, among other deleterious substances, that have been found in some natural health products.

“Our government is committed to reintroducing food product safety legislation,” Ms. Waler said. “It was in our platform that we will introduce new product safety legislation that will be in the spirit of C-51.”

The numerous advisories risk damaging consumer confidence in natural products, which are used regularly by about four out of 10 Canadians.

Jamieson, one of the largest Canadian-based supplement makers, held a news conference in Toronto yesterday to showcase its own product safety protocol, which it says is one of the best in the business. It also renewed its call for more federal oversight of the industry.

Federal regulation has “been too slow and did not go far enough,” says Vic Neufeld, Jamieson’s president and chief executive officer. “The Canadian consumer has to be protected.”

Among Jamieson’s safety steps are the auditing of its own suppliers and dedicating about 20 per cent of its work force to quality control and testing.

Mr. Neufeld said one weakness in Canada is that a company importing a health product ingredient only has to conduct safety tests on one shipment from offshore suppliers each year. In South Korea, by contrast, the government requires every batch that Jamieson sends there to be tested.

But a spokesman for one of the companies that led the fight against bill C-51 said his firm opposes more rules.

Ian Stewart, director of regulatory affairs for Truehope Nutritional Support Ltd., maker of a nutrient supplement the company purports to help against mental illness, says new rules will be used by the government “to restrict and remove natural health products from the market.” He said the beneficiaries of increased regulation would be the large drug and supplement companies.

Source | See Also under Food: Ontario farmer found guilty of contempt in raw-milk trial | Listeria reporting rule dropped before crisis | Tests find melamine in candies, milk, infant formula from China | New study raises concerns Bisphenol-A could be related to heart disease | Govt. Report: Fluoride in Water Supply Harms Thyroid Function | Raw milk fans rally at court for dairy farmer | Bayer on defensive in bee deaths | Hunger in Africa blamed on western rejection of GM food | Are we already dining on clones? | Bisphenol tied to lower brain function | Radiation touted to protect meat | GM crops could lead to ‘disaster’: Prince Charles | Chemical Industry Source of Hyped FDA Study ‘Exonerating’ Plastic Bottles | You can’t stop the raw milk, activist says | Small Farmers Pushed to Plant GM Seed | American thinktanks sowed seeds of food crisis | Sludge biosolids decried as ‘toxic stew’, used as fertilizer | Home-grown veg ruined by toxic fertiliser | Agribusiness positions GM crops as panacea to predicted global food shortage | Monsanto Plans to Save World with its Biotech Crops | Naturopaths Fear Proposed Bill C-51 | Farmer Surveilled, Raided for Natural Milk Operation has Trial Delayed | High-level UN task force to tackle global food crisis | Farmers to kill off 150,000 pigs | Head of IMF says if food prices remain high, consequences are dire | Canada’s C-51 Law May Outlaw 60% Of Natural Health Products | Codex Alimentarius — An Emerging Threat | Codex Alimentarius Commission adopts more than 50 new food standards

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