Changes In The Law To Affect Us & YOU
Tuesday 8th June 2010
Are you aware of the Changes in Law affecting Supplements and Herbal Products?
In 2002 two new European wide directives were passed in order to homogenise the European Vitamin and Herbal Industry. The directives will be fully implemented by 2011 and will greatly restrict the products British consumers can buy.
The directives are complicated legal documents however here is a simplified version of the directives.
Foods Supplements Directive
This directive comes in two parts. Firstly which ingredients can be used in food supplements and secondly the maximum levels used.
The second part, maximum permitted levels will be decided later this year and is a great concern to most industry insiders. They are concerned as the likelihood is that in the UK we will loose a large percentage of the supplements currently available in order to homogenise with the French and German market. Higher dose supplements may be available however will have to be prescribed by Doctors. To put this into perspective one large manufacturers is looking into formulating Vitamin C tablets as low as 10mg, the most popular Vitamin C strength currently is 500mg or 1000mg!
It is well known that Britain has a very unusual Supplement and Herbal Market when compared to the rest of Europe and these countries along with Pharmaceutical Companies (who will be able to provide larger dose supplements for prescription at much higher cost) are pushing for the maximum levels to be set as low as possible.
Traditional Herbal Medicinal Products Directive
This directive will force all Traditional Remedies, which have been available safely for centuries, to carry a licence. This on paper may sound like a good idea however is actually going to remove nearly all available herbal products, as in order to acquire a product licence it costs approximately £20,000 - £40,000 per remedy. All products will have to meet inappropriate and expensive pharmaceutical testing standards which small companies simply cannot afford.
All of our locally grown herbal products will be lost and the few products that survive will be created by European Corporate Giants or Large Pharmaceutical companies who can afford the ridiculous price of licensing.
So if you take any Supplements or Herbal products or would at least like the freedom of choice to do so please join me in campaigning the British government to intervene and allow Britain to stay as a free market place for Natural Product which have shown their safety continuously over thousands of years.
Instead of lumping our vibrant Natural Medicines market in with the European market which insists on a “guilty until proven innocent” approach putting potentially thousands of jobs on the line and severely restricting consumers’ choice in this area of the market.
Please contact your local MP or prospective MP and any Local or National media provider to bring this issue into the public eye, if we do not act now by this time next year it will be too late!
A template letter to send to the European Commission is available from the address below.
All you have to do is print and post!
http://www.consumersforhealthchoice.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=401&Itemid=236
To find out more please contact a member of the supplements team or look at the following websites:
www.consumersforhealthchoice.com
www.thenhf.com
http://www.anhcampaign.org
http://www.eliant.eu
Regards,
Jenny Macdonald, MNIMH
Supplements Coordinator
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