could someone please tell me that

[stellanoir]

this e-mail I got yesterday is untrue. . .?

Subject: IMPORTANT: Vitamin news: WTO and CODEX

Important Vitamin News

"Once again, your right to choose your vitamin, mineral and other supplements may end in June of this year (2005). After that, U.S. supplements will be defined and controlled by the World Trade Organization (WTO) and the World Health Organization (WHO). The CODEX ALIMENTARIUS (Food Code) is setting the supplement standards for all countries in the WTO. They will be enforced by the WTO and will over ride U.S. laws. The U.S. President and Congress agreed to this take-over when the WTO Treaty was signed. Violations are punished by WTO trade sanctions. CODEX drastically restricts vitamins, minerals, herbs and other supplements. CODEX met secretly in November, 2004 and finalized Step 8 (the final stage) to begin implementation in June, 2005. The CODE includes:

(1) No supplement can be sold for preventive or therapeutic use.

(2) Any potency higher than RDA (minimal strength) is a drug requiring a prescription and must be produced by drug companies. Over 5000 safe items now in health stores will be banned, terminating health stores as we now know them.

(3) CODEX regulations become binding internationally.

(4) New supplements are banned unless given very expensive CODEX testing and approval.

CODEX now applies to Norway and Germany, among others, where zinc tablets rose from $4 per bottle to $52. Echinacea (an ancient immune-enhancement herb) rose from $14 to $153 (both examples are now allowed by prescription only). They are now drugs. Vitamin C above 200 mg, niacin above 32 mg, vitamin B6 above 4 mg all are banned over-the-counter as drugs. No amino acids (arginine, lysine, carnitine, essential fatty acids (omegas 3, 6, 9, etc.), or other essential supplements such as DMEA, DHEA, CoQ10, MSM, beta-carotene, etc. are allowed. The CODEX rules are not based on real science. They are made by a few people meeting in secret (see web sites below), not necessarily scientists. In 1993 the FDA and drug corporations tried to put all supplements under restriction and prescription. But over 4 million Americans told Congress and the President to protect their freedom of choice on health supplements. The DSHEA Law was passed in 1994, which oes so. But this will be over ruled by CODEX and the World Trade Organization. Virtually nothing about it has been in the media. What the drug corporations have failed to do through Congress they have gotten by sneak attack through CODEX with the help of a silent media.

What can be done at this late hour?

(1) Spread the word as much as possible. Inform yourselves fully at www.ahha.org (www.codexinfo.org, http://www.codexinfo.org, www.iahf.com, http://www.iahf.com, and www.alliance-natural-health.org.

(2) Oppose bills S.722 and H.R.3377. These support the CODEX restrictions with U.S. laws, changing the DSHEA law.

(3) Support H. R.1146 which would restore the sovereignty of the U.S. Constitution over CODEX, etc.

(4) Express your wishes to the President, Senators and Representatives (They got us into this!) ASAP.

(5) Contact multi-level health marketing groups that can get their members to inform the government.

CODEX and the FDA wish to protect us by controlling supplements in the same way they do prescription drugs. There is no need for more FDA control of supplements than is already in place, which is substantial. Instead of drastically restricting supplements, why doesn't the FDA better control and restrict the extremely dangerous pharmaceutical drugs which are now killing us at the rate of a major airline crash per day? "

Can you imagine how many uninsured individual who use supplements to keep themselves healthy will fall ill? This cannot happen.

[RockaFowler]

1. It is UNTRUE

I saw this yesterday, and I looked up snopes (Urban Legends). Here is the link . . .
http://www.snopes.com/politics/medical/vitamins.asp

[stellanoir]

2. Phew and thanks

[SheilaT]

3. Once again, the basic rule is

if it looks too good or too bizarre or too something else to be true, check it out on Snopes. Also, you could ask yourself why you hadn't heard about this thing (the vitamin supplement rules) in some other source before this. All the health food stores would be completely up in arms if they couldn't sell the kinds of supplements they like to sell.

This particular email looks especially reliable because it seems to have specific Senate and House Bill numbers. All the more reason to go to snopes.

But thanks for posting this for us.

[stellanoir]

4. Yeah. . .I agree

But did you catch this part. . .?

"Viiamin and minerals are not under the gun. Dietary supplements are. And no outside regulatory body is behind this move: the proposed legislation is the work of American lawmakers looking to seafeguard the public from the unscrupulous and the hazardous. . . ."

So I'm still somewhat concerned since I use herbal tinctures and chinese botanicals regularly.

[On the Road]

5. Think of the Controversy When Ephedrine Was Banned

That's only one substance.

This is pretty clearly right-wing agitprop. Rightly or wrongly, the US is not about to allow an international body to pull all non-vitamin supplements off the shelves.