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Originally published January 21 2004

The FDA now plans to assault herbal medicines

by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor

Prescription drugs injure 2.2 million Americans each year and manage to kill well over 100,000. The FDA is charged with the safety of such drugs, so what does the FDA plan to do now? Assault herbal medicine, of course. After banning ephedra -- an herb that has been safely use in China for literally thousands of years and has only been associated with a handful of deaths in the United States -- the FDA apparently feels compelled to go after other natural medicines that compete with the profits of prescription drugs, which the FDA seems determined to protect.

This isn't rational, and it's not science: it's a witch hunt. There is no set level of risk for a drug or nutritional supplement that triggers a ban by the FDA. Rather, the FDA simply allows virtually any drug to stay on the market, regardless of how many patients it kills (Rezulin, a diabetes drug, reportedly killed 10,000 people and damaged the livers of 100,000 before the FDA finally pulled it), while simultaneously applying an entirely different standard to herbal medicines and nutritional supplements.

This is just one of many reasons why we seriously need FDA reform. The FDA has forgotten its mission and betrayed the American public by defending -- in fact, promoting -- the commercial interests of drug companies alone. And in doing so, it has put us all at risk.


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