One of them happens to be a popular over-the-counter NSAID. I personally know the attorneys who are responsible for TENS victims and going after a certain big-name NSAID.
It's taken YEARS to even get a warning label approval, and that will be years more in the making.
This only proves the point that if the industry cannot self-regulate, then we need an organization to provide some safety guidelines for quality control and validity testing.
Maybe not the FDA. Maybe the
Counsil for Responsible Nutrition. Or maybe another middle of the road organization.
Without some controls in place, this liberal thinking of "let me make whatever choices I want to make" clearly is not safe as proven by your NASID comment.
In fact, there were so many problems with it, the FDA was petitioned so much it moved slowly to change the labels. Slowly becuase it's a big ass government organization that has to look at things very carefully. Under-funded and under-staffed, it's not like they can do much "overnight."
Anyway, in the case of NASID's, here's a group of drugs that passed all the self-imposed and other governmental regulations in place. Yet there WERE numerous problems.
And the FDA had to get involved.
Without the FDA or somebody getting involved, the poor consumer is screwed.
I wonder if there was some middle organization that was able to self-regulate this and impose warnings, safety levels or quality controls if this incident might be different?
Such is the case with supplements.
While creatine isn't in the same category as inflamatory drugs, there still needs to be some self-imposed,
self-regulation within the industry to ensure safe is meet, quality control is assured and valid testing is done for the supplement in question.
Self-Regulation with a partnership with the FDA would be ideal. Not the FDA stepping in and making hasty, misinformed judgements to ruin the industry but not supplement companies lying and misleading consumers.
I think the dietary industry
IS capable of self-regulation and the responsible companies are working towards it. They dislike the little guys who cheat, lie, and steal to make a profit while making the entire industry look bad.
Today marked the end of the DCAT 2007 conference.
When an FDA spokesperson was asked directly what level of involvement they saw themselves having in the dietary industry as ideal the
answer was...
"A partnership between the FDA and the dietary supplement industry." They clearly knew the dietary industry was better versed in the supplement at hand and they saw themselves having a partnership vs. having to step in and make quick, wrong decisions that could ruin a profit potential and leave companies in the lurch without any way out.
Take that statement with a grain of salt if you want but...
The mass hysteria from the liberal left is unwaraned and does nothing to ensure this industry is self-regulated.
There's SEVERAL responsible companies who are pushing for valid testing practices, quality control, label guidlines within the industry. All who have employees who are qualified to make such decisions.
The last few days of hysteria have been not much more than a computer virus hoax.
And by that I mean that there is
some truth to it but it's hard to get to it beyond the smoke and gas being pour to start a massive fire!
The FDA writes a document and then we hear from the far left and all the lawyers about how it's over. Freedom is being taken away! Your creatine is next and if this continues, you'll have the DSHEA repealed without a congressional act. Then it's your right to vote and your guns.
What we
DON'T hear much (except in my small attemps) is somebody in the middle trying to say..
"Hey... While I don't want the FDA who's not qualified to tell me about my creatine, I also don't want this industry to just do whatever the hell it wants without any accountability." I want a little
self-reguation within the industry to ensure me, as the consumer, is somewhat protected from misleading claims and at the same time, I don't want a misinformed big governement agency making decisions based on wrong facts without a way to appeal that ruling.
At the moment, all I keep seeing is the left side screaming how horrible this is and we all need to sign petitions and act quickly.
Mass hysteria is usually
ALWAYS incorrect and uses facts and emotionally charged words to make their point.
I know the truth to be somewhere in the middle between the FDA and a responsible self-regulated industry.
Let's end with this...
The last time Americans got this mad about health freedom, Congress unanimously passed the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act of 1994 (DSHEA) protecting our access to supplements.
And that opened the door in the opposite direction. Many companies, unregulated, made all kinds of crazy ass claims and screwed consumers out of their money based on false hope. Becuase they could. There was little to no regulation. It was nearly impossible to make an informed choice based on an unregulated industry.
Just as too much regulation (before DSHEA) was BAD... so is too little.
The answer lies somewhere in the middle and from what I can see, the groups with the dietary supplement industry are working towards that and the FDA isn't as closed minded about that as you might be lead to believe.