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Major Retailers Accused of Selling Fraudulent Herbal Supplements
MikeChino writes: The New York State Attorney General's Office is demanding that GNC, Walmart, Walgreens, and Target remove store brand herbal supplements from their shelves after the pills were found to be packed with a strange array of fraudulent—and in some cases hazardous—ingredients. Popular supplements such as ginseng, valerian root, and St. John's wort sold under store brand names at the four major retailers were found to contain powdered rice, asparagus, and even houseplants, while being completely void of any of the ingredients on the label.
Because the ones that list their actual ingredients are honest and factual?
What's the big deal? Instead of getting "Useless Compound X," buyers were getting "Useless Compound Y."
Note: Yes, I'm partially kidding. People are entitled to get the woo they've been promised, and I suppose there are allergy issues involved.
But of course it's perfectly ok to sell fraudule...err, homeopathic "remedies" which do not and cannot work any different than a placebo.
So sell them as homeopathic and charge even more (because they are more powerful, right!)
But the Republican/Libertarian said regulation is bad!
Other than lightening the consumers wallet. Same for the Tommy Copper crap. They should have to publish results from double-blind studies. Otherwise it's a scam.
Every herbal supplement that is going to be ingested in America needs a COA (Certificate of Authenticity) to verify their legitimacy. Disclosure: I used to work in the herbal supplement industry. This is not wholly uncommon. The biggest issue here is that the suppliers/manufacturers were ripping off the GNC etc. Someone along the way faile dto check the authenticity, and they got burned.
If they did work, they get called DRUGS.
The prime examples is caffeine.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
As you say, it's irrelevant that the supplements don't work: what matters is the false advertizing. This is a legitimate consumer protection issue, unlilke all the nannying and moralizing I'm using to getting from the NY State Attroneys General.
I'm highly skeptical of store brands as a whole. They're much cheaper than the national brands, and claim to be the same thing. But, as they're "supplements", FDA doesn't check. We should just trust CVS, Walgreens, etc, to be telling the truth, right? I mean, they're huge, honest companies and they distribute real medicines, so you know they are taking great care to make sure the stuff they sell is as advertised. Let's do a sniff test on that statement. Nope. Doesn't pass. I suppose the store brands *could* be legit, and I could be getting a great deal -- exact same, high quality multivitamins for 1/4 the cost of the national brand. But my spidey sense says, no. Rice flour and rat droppings are far more likely, especially since the package gives no indication of where the product originates, just "Distributed by CVS". Yeah, that in itself inspires a whole lot of confidence...NOT.
I suspect this has something to do with outsurcing herbal supplements for the cheapest price to a country that begins with letter c. If they don't care about reusing sewer oil for their own population imagine what they might sell you.
That's what you get when your supplier is the lowest bidder, and zero checks and balances are in place, all in the name of profit.
Meanwhile, some MBA that set up the deal is relaxing on his Yacht. This is capitalism at work.
If telephones are outlawed, then only outlaws will have telephones.
How dare big brother get in the way of free enterprise!
The government should just keep its nose out of peoples business and let the free market handle things.
Liberty for All!
Surprise? No!
It's not about whether the stuff works or not; the customer should get what they pay for, and not get extraneous crap they may be allergic to.
Same goes for ratings on movies, books, etc. - if a customer wants something, or wants to avoid something, it's not about passing judgement on the customer's interests, but about making sure that people can get what they want AND avoid what they don't want.
supplement company: check out our new herbal animal vegetable raw vegan youth potion penis elixer and life enhancer with guanaramalama and bilinko for supported function of your satrogenum B9
AG: this is nothing but brake dust, old chinese newspaper shreds, and windshield glass
supplement company: well its been on the market for 2 years and is completely safe.
AG: yeah but it doesnt do what it says and contains things it doesnt list. pull it.
supplement company: sure thing buddy! let me just step over this large mountain of cash I earned and ill get right to it. sure am sorry about the mixup.
Stores: oh we sure are super sorry too, turns out we got distracted by counting all this money.
Supplement company: who wants to sell this new supplement! its got enhanced vigorators and revitalomic green tea tomato lyzopramic dyloricackles to enhance your penis life
Stores: who are we do deny the customer!
AG: THIS IS JUST SHREDDED PHONEBOOKS AND CAFFEINE
supplement company: it iiiiiis? oh my worrrrd it happened again! goodness gracious.
Good people go to bed earlier.
What's the difference between this surreptitiously fraudulent store-brand crap (does not contain stated ingredients unproven to work) versus purposely fraudulent homeopathic crap (explicitly does not contain ingredients for the stated purpose)?
They're all placebos, and they are a genuine danger to ignorant people who need actual treatment for actual medical conditions. It'd be interesting to see a solid study of how many people are killed each year through opting for homeopathic flu and pneumonia cures, instead of actual treatment.
I think not...(*poof*)
It's not like these things actually *do* anything more than a placebo in the first place. Just ask the FDA about that. Pack'em with powdered sugar and sell sell sell. If there was *any* hope that this herb could treat that sickness where money could be made selling it, big pharma would have snapped it up and sold it under FDA rules as a drug, even over the counter. But no, they think herbal medicine is somehow slipping between the cracks with doctors and the FDA aligned to stomp out all this homeopathic, herbal nonsense and keep you from getting something that can only help you... Right...
And now people are complaining because somebody sold them something else in their herbal supplements? Cry me a river.. Don't be duped on this kind of "snake oil" science, don't buy this stuff. Especially don't buy this stuff at discount retailers where Quality Control is defined by how much shoplifting doesn't go on...Whacha think is going to happen when you buy that "supplement" at half the street price?
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
Foot, meet bullet.
Perpetrating fraud will bring a lot of attention to an industry that has never liked regulatory scrutiny.
The side-effect of greed is stupidity.
Now their customers get heat as well - target,walmart, gnc will be very displeased with the industry as well.
I can't decide whether this says more about corporate greed or about the culture of alternative medicine, that these retailers can make such a flagrant mockery of herbal supplements, and apparently get away with it for quite a while.
They found powdered legumes in some of the products.
People with peanut allergies may want to know that it's in there...
AC b/c posting at work.
Over-regulation is bad. Selling a bottle that is 100% not what it says on the label, is a reasonable expectation. Call it what you want - false advertising, fraud, etc. It's clearly something that shouldn't be permitted. I don't think you'd get much argument from either side of the isle.
Er, aisle.
"dietary supplements, which are exempt from the strict regulatory oversight applied to prescription drugs."
Quite well manipulated strike, on the dietary supplements, the War though is for the power of controlling and regulating them and soon one will not be able to buy a dietary supplement without a prescription from a Doc, such a nonsense.
Soon to come, one will need a prescription drug to buy vegetables from the local store, but of course, buying any processed poison/food will be absolutely unregulated.
For everyone information: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_dhlp8jSiiU
There's no actual treatment of flu.
on unscrupulous suppliers. Now if only they would start to go after those guys that put grass clippings in my packets of Spice; honestly, I don't know why they don't just use tobacco leaves.
(peers closely at bottle) ...are you saying that this isn't GENUINE snake oil?
-Styopa
This is where you can use the legal world for some laughs and social goodness. Someone that was taking one of these bunk supplements to some terminal disease based on statements by [random marketer x] should sue saying that their death was a result of [company's] fraud in providing the wrong ingredients and that if [company] had provided [bunk product] that the person would have lived.
In response, [company] will have to say either: there's no proof we ripped you off, and then in the alternative, they'll fight the bullshit science used to support these claims which will get all the suppliers in a tizzy. At worst, it's good for a few laughs. At best, you get a few major corporations admitting that the "science" thrown around to support all these supplements aren't justified, and you still get a few laughs.
But the Republican/Libertarian said regulation is bad!
Nope...That's NOT what they say.
The ones I hear talking about this say that government and regulation should be as SMALL as possible; that OVER REGULATION and large government is bad.
There is a MAJOR difference between what they actually say and what you claim they say.
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
"...while being completely void of any of the ingredients on the label...."
Stay with me here.. but isn't that meant to be the STRONGEST preparation of all under homeopathic principles? I think that they should be charged with giving people illegal overdoses...
I don't think you'd get much argument from either side of the isle.
Orrin Hatch (R-UT) that kook did this:
He was the chief author of a federal law enacted 17 years ago that allows companies to make general health claims about their products, but exempts them from federal reviews of their safety or effectiveness before they go to market.
.
That fucker is the one - like all republicans - only cares about corporate profits and theirs and fuck the people.
The store-brand crap claims to contain an ingredient it doesn't contain. The homeopathic crap claims to not contain an ingredient it doesn't contain. It should be obvious how those are different.
Unless you're Orin Hatch
Your hair look like poop, Bob! - Wanker.
When you sell crap people won't buy it if they know what it is. That is regulation force. Decent people don't want to commit fraud and those are the people you want to do business with. People that stand behind their products wouldn't try to sell you a lie. You would be a fool to buy herbal supplements from a big box store. Good herbal supplements are expensive and sold by people that understand the difference between sawdust and what they are selling. Those big box stores get the cheapest junk from China. They have the attitude that it is all snake oil. You are the fool for buying something like this from someone that does not care about you or the product. People like this AC ^ would do business with sheisters and run to whoever will hear them tattle-tell instead of having the acumen to asses the quality of a product before buying it.
If some idiot wants to buy 20C whatever that's their business. It's only a problem if the what is in the bottle is actually something different or false claims are made about efficacy.
Homeopathic "remedies" are the very definition of false claims regarding efficacy.
Over-regulation is bad. Selling a bottle that is 100% not what it says on the label, is a reasonable expectation. Call it what you want - false advertising, fraud, etc. It's clearly something that shouldn't be permitted. I don't think you'd get much argument from either side of the isle.
Regulation is a slippery slope. First you start regulating that's what's in the bottle match what's listed on the outside--because its an expectation. Next you start regulating that what's inside the bottle actually do what it's claimed to do--because that's a reasonable expectation too. And that's even more government oversight leading to a huge government bureaucracy that requires things like research, testing, evidence and oversight. It would create huge and intrusive government agency costing the tax victims billions of dollars and giving the government highly intrusive powers to regulate an otherwise free market.
So that's just an absolutely awful idea.
I RTFA and the links and I didn't see any mention of the source manufacturor, but If I had to guess, I would guess they were made under contract in China and labelled with whichever distributor was buying today's production run.
US FDA/USDA-style regulatory enforcement and quality controls are practically non-existant in China. Just look at the great melamine scare a few years ago where they where bumping up the "protein" level of ingrediants by adding toxic melamine (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2... and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2...).
All imports of food/drug or ingrediants from china should be banned out-right.
Uh, one of the tenets of the Libertarian platform is "No force or fraud." This is certainly fraud, and therefore a suitable target of government force.
"National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
You are confused, there are already regulations and they were broken in this case. The solution is there already in existing law.
Wrong. The true libertarians will argue that this is excessive government regulation, and that the government should stay out of commercial affairs like this, and that the "invisible hand of the holy free market" will correct these problems. So if someone wants to sell baby formula with melamine in it, libertarians think that should be perfectly legal and that bad word-of-mouth will put such companies out of business (after some babies die from it--oh well), and that the government should just keep its nose out of it.
This is precisely why libertarianism, in its pure form, is lunacy.
With Republicans, it really depends on how much libertarian kool-aid they've been drinking. Not all Republicans are that extreme. (I don't normally have much good to say about today's Republicans, but I'm not going to be untruthful about them either. They do mostly suck, the Teabaggers really suck, but to say they're all against all regulation is patently false, they're just generally very big-business-friendly and not very helpful to poorer or middle-class Americans.)
There's a giant difference.
Homeopathic "crap" is actually highly purified water. So while it probably isn't going to help your ailment (though it might: the placebo effect is real!), it's not going to hurt you either.
These fraudelent supplements are made from all kinds of crap, some of it apparently even harmful. So taking it could cause you an allergic reaction or worse.
There's Tamiflu, which can lessen flu symptoms. So there's that.
Occasionally living proof of the Ballmer peak.
Yes, marketing a useless supplement and listing what's in it is less fraudulent that marketing a useless supplement that misrepresents its ingredients.
It is not clear that these substances are useless.
It's also not clear that they are useful. Just because someone makes a claim about efficacy doesn't mean a thing without evidence.
Saying herbal medicine works, without evidence, is unscientific. Saying it doesn't work, without evidence, is also unscientific.
True but there ARE studies on a lot of this stuff that DOES say it doesn't work or that it is no different than placebo or in some cases is actually harmful.
Many herbs that have been tested, have turned out to be very effective, and many modern medicines are based on chemicals first found in herbs.
That has no bearing regarding the ones being sold here. Yes some herbs have medicinal effects. That doesn't mean you assume they do until they've actually been tested for efficacy using double blind studies.
You would think that the people selling the stuff would have an interest in proving these things were effective (perhaps via an industry association).
Why? People buy it anyway and the studies cost many millions of dollars. They have NO interest in proving (or disproving) anything about these supplements. In fact they had congress pass laws explicitly preventing the FDA from regulating them so that they wouldn't have to prove their claims.
Hrm, would say I second that, but sloppy seconds are not my cup of tea.
It's two different issues.
Not really. Both are lies. The only difference is the precise nature of the deceit. Both are selling something that they know (or should know) has no proven medical benefit. Both meet the definition of fraud which is a deception deliberately practiced to secure unfair or unlawful gain. Whether you misrepresent or conceal the facts, in either case it still is fraud.
Over-regulation is bad.
Quackery is worse.
There is over regulation, making sure the stuff in the bottle is the exact same as what the label says.
Then there is casual regulation, where there is stuff in the bottle and a label, and you get money for it.
Sure, but it beats "Grade A premium Pork Sausage" being 80% rat and 20% rat poison.
Sometimes you have to choose the lesser even even if that means expending a lot of resources keeping the assholes honest.
This is NOT a case of needing new regulations, we already HAVE regulations that cover this. What we need is a few class action lawsuits from customers who purchased one thing but got another... Problem will fix itself, eventually.
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
To those saying "You've replaced one fraud with another": while I tend to agree that many herbal supplements are complete horseshit, I know for a fact that two of those listed in the summary (St John's Wort and Valerian Root) are not. There's tons of research backing the effectiveness of both of those herbal medicines, and lots of people take them to notable effect on a daily basis.
I guess that instead of selling you the junk that they are claiming to be selling you, they'll be selling you a different type of junk.
Thank you for your 5th grade level analysis.
Looks like they used some questionable testing procedures and the New York AG may be a little premature:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/da...
Just today we had someone arguing that instead of health regulation that says restaurant employees should wash their hands when they come out of the bathroom that we should let the "free market" handle it.
How does the free market handle it? Do we wait until people die to find out people are going something wrong?
You are absolutely wrong here. The nutball elements of the far right want no regulation at all.
Er, aisle.
It sounds suspiciously Welsh.
The nutball elements of the far right want no regulation at all.
The nutball left keep saying that ALL of the right want no regulation. Can we stop this please? Because nobody who is RESPONSIBLE wants what you claim, and nobody RESPONSIBLE applies the raving of the nutballs to the whole.
Where does that leave you and me?
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
>. Not all Republicans are that extreme. (I don't normally have much good to say about today's Republicans, but I'm not going to be untruthful about them either. They do mostly suck, the Teabaggers really suck, but to say they're all against all regulation is patently false, they're just generally very big-business-friendly and not very helpful to poorer or middle-class Americans.)
I for one appreciate your intellectual honesty. So many people will be complicit in lies, and even actively spread lies, about people they disagree with. I've made similar statements about specific Democrats and their party platform.
Obama, for example, doesn't actually want to destroy America and establish a totalitarian regime. He wants things that he thinks will be good. His administration is only destructive because he's incompetent, like Bush Jr was before him.
But the Republican/Libertarian said regulation is bad!
Nope...That's NOT what they say.
The ones I hear talking about this say that government and regulation should be as SMALL as possible; that OVER REGULATION and large government is bad.
There is a MAJOR difference between what they actually say and what you claim they say.
"SMALL" being defined as "if it fits our platform".
It's OK to regulate birth control. Just don't regulate factory discharges that produce birth defects.
While the idea of harmful ingredients being included is very problematic, I can't imagine these supplements worked any less well than they would have if they actually contained the advertised ingredients. They are basically placebo sugar pills.
Think potential for allergic responses, knucklehead. If you are allergic to wheat and it has undisclosed wheat products in the pill, you just might swell up like a balloon and die.
You might find that upsetting.
And history repeats itself. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P...
The only thing worse than a Democrat is a Republican.
Maybe, if the lawsuits could use RIAA-style pricing for the fine: $150,000 per fake bottle sold.
As is though, when have you seen a "class-action" lawsuit exceed 10's of Millions? How many million bottles of fake-contents do you think have been sold?
To eventually fix itself, the fine would need to exceed the profits. That never happens.
Well, maybe.
Number of trials: N
Number of trials with published results: n N.
Dealing with nutball state legislators who demand Muslim visitors pledge allegiance to the United States and renounce terrorism.
That has been called into question.
One is what it claims to be and the other is not.
That's exactly what they do. You know those boner pills they sell at the gas station? They contain counterfeit viagra, and eventually they get shut down after they wade through their mountains of cash.
Why am I completely unsurprised that Salt Lake City is a hotbed for peddling *medical* bullshit.
The true libertarians will argue that this is excessive government regulation, and that the government should stay out of commercial affairs like this, and that the "invisible hand of the holy free market" will correct these problems.
LIbertarians are likely to differ. Some might argue let them kill people and then sort it out with lawsuits. However, truth in labeling is something a lot of fairly hard-core libertarians would probably go along with. They wouldn't want the government banning the sale of any substance, but they would probably favor letting the buyer know what he is getting.
Selling adulterated supplements would be like selling a slave without disclosing that he has artificial teeth. That would be an abuse of the market.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WA0wKeokWUU
All I can say of all the postings here is:
Start watching John Oliver he ran a story on this freaking last year.
The FDA has almost no power over supplements by order of congress.
I guess they weren't homeopathic because those contain NO active ingredients!
Start taking ginko & ginsing morning and night. After about a week you'll be so awake and alert it's almost overpowering.
Or one of the 'herbal' things. Tea tree oil or eucalyptus WILL kill athletes foot when nothing else will.
And it's dirt cheap. Easy to use. And not a fucking mess like everything else.
And if your feet are in that 'omg on fire' stage of athletes foot. Peppermint oil WILL kill the burning within minutes when no other product will make it stop.
So some of this crap does work. The problem is sorting out all of the 'omg this cures EVERYTHING' claims from the actual uses.
And finding the right products that contain what they actually claim from companys who will prove it has that in it. As in this story here.
But disregarding it all as herbal garbage is stupid. Thousands of actual drugs started out as herbal sources.
Got refined. Got expensive. And are now used worldwide.
However, truth in labeling is something a lot of fairly hard-core libertarians would probably go along with. They wouldn't want the government banning the sale of any substance, but they would probably favor letting the buyer know what he is getting.
I think any libertarians that agree with this are probably more "soft-core". The hard-core ones want a government that does absolutely nothing besides provide police and military, and really want no regulation at all because that requires a government agency to enforce competently.
No. One claims to do something it does not.* The other claims to be something it is not, to the same outcome.
Both mislead the consumer, both are equally as useless, and both may be dangerous to a person believing they have treated a condition when they have not. Barring extra harmful substances in the fake pills, the only substantive difference from homeopathic remedies is _when_ the lie is told.
*Specifically, the idea that a homeopathic potion "is what it claims to be" is wrong, in that it claims to be a treatment for a condition or to effect a change in a condition. It absolutely does not and cannot, unless one throws out basic laws of physics and chemistry. Homeopathy is solid bullshit from roots to branch, and it occasionally kills people.
I think not...(*poof*)
That is a fantasy. Class action suits only enrichen the lawyers running them. The lawyers get 30-50% of the settlement, where the other 100,000 have to split the rest of the settlement. Do the math quick, and a $20mill suit gets the lawyers say $5mil (40%). There is $15mil split between 100,000 folks or $150 per person. They probably don't even get that much when you figure what the administrative fees are.
I guess to Joe Sixpack, a free $150 will buy some beer, and make a weekend worth living again. Or maybe they will buy some protein shakes and bulk up to beat up the lawyer that promised 'em $millions.
You're a real scientist aren't you - the only reason that drug companies don't pursue alternative medicines is financial - not proven medical value. If a drug company could patent a natural remedy they would be pushing that on everybody.
No excessive profit potential = no research and no investment.
No. It is a homeopathic preparation. Made in the standard way. If you look closely, the bottle makes no claims to do anything at all. If you happen to believe it will do something, fine. If not, then I can't imagine why you would buy it. Either way, works or not, it's on the buyer.
OTOH, the fake herbal supplements do not contain what they claim to. Even if the herb works (and yes, some do), that particular one won't because it contains someone's old houseplants instead. It moves the blame for failure to the fraudulent manufacturer.
Some people don't believe vaccines do anything. One of them might claim "what's the harm if that mmr vial only contains sterile water, it makes no practical difference. But I'll bet you would be plenty pissed off to discover you didn't get what you paid for, because you believe that if you had, you would have been immunized.
Isn't the point here to make manufacturers mindful of making sure the contents match the label? A class action would cost the manufacturer a LOT of money and make it unprofitable to sell stuff that doesn't match the labeling. So what if that means the lawyers get most of the money... Haven't we hit the original goal?
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
Note: this technique requires DNA to be present; manufacturing techniques that are not simple "powders" may not have their DNA preserved during process. Note, that this procedure in testing is untested against the huge variety of botanical species. The USP, which has a 100+ year history, just recently started promulgating botanical standards, despite decades of investigation - and it is for standardized extracts of -particular compounds- in the plant, not the plant DNA itself.
This sounds like it is more political than scientific.
To eventually fix itself, the fine would need to exceed the profits. That never happens.
Oh come on, sure it does. These guys don't have money to burn. They are running on razor thin margins as large retailers have pressed them on price. The manufacturers are NOT making billions upon billions ripping people off in most cases, they are struggling to keep afloat while the likes of Wal-Mart beat them down on price, ask for placement fees trim their margins so the retailer can turn more product though their inventory. Big Retail is about turning your inventory dollars as fast as you can (which is why Radio Shack bit the big one). Turning inventory requires that you do VOLUME and that requires the perception that your PRICE is the best so the customers will come to you, spend their money buying the stuff you have in the store.
Margins are razor thin for everybody in these cases and everybody has to focus on turning inventory over as fast as they can.
A few million dollars lost to lawsuits will be huge problems for all but the largest of these companies. Even the big boys would shy away from the publicity and costs of loosing a lawsuit like this.
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
Either way, they're getting a heaping helping of placebo. That's all they're really buying, anyway.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
Arguing about a bottle label? Now you're just trollin.'
Homeopathy is a system that claims to treat disease. A homeopathic preparation "made in the standard way" incorporates those claims, even if the FDA/equiv prohibits printing that claim on the bottle. This is because the preparation and method have been subjected to rigorous scientific and medical examination (for over two centuries) and found to be fake medicines before the fact.
Herbal supplements also claim to treat disease, and some of them have been found effective through scientific and medical examination. An herbal supplement (or any other medicine at all) that doesn't contain the specified substance is found to be a fake medicine after the fact.
I suppose the difference is "can't work" versus "doesn't work." Now if you're arguing that I ought to trust homeopathic preparations to actually be pure water when the entire system's basis has been utterly debunked.... that boils down to trusting a systemic liar to be consistent (and not to include harmful stuff). That's somehow better than finding incidents of lying (and possibly including harmful stuff) in a consistent supply chain? Really, really, no.
I think not...(*poof*)
the whole "herbal supplement" industry is based on fraud and misdirection.
No, I am arguing that people have their beliefs and regardless of whether I share them or not, they have a legal expectation of getting what they have paid for. If they want to pay someone to do a rain dance (that is, a dance that was traditionally believed to bring rain), they should expect a rain dance, not some guy randomly wiggling his ass.
If it works or not is another matter that could easily verge close to asking the courts to decide whose religious belief is correct. I'm sure you can see the pitfalls in that path.
Yeah, I once baught a bottle labeled "label 5". It also said there was scotch wisky in it, but it didn't taste mutch like that.
The ones I hear talking about this say that government and regulation should be as SMALL as possible; that OVER REGULATION and large government is bad.
It's interesting, though, that these regulations usually come along when things go wrong. The ones who complain about "over regulation" are the ones who want to get away with something but they can't because there are regulations against it.
In other words, who defines what "Over regulation" is? Can you give me an example of an industry that is "over regulated"? Of what particular regulations would be "over"?
to improve your health, you're very confused.
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
I always go last. That way you don't have anyone tapping you on the shoulder, asking you to hurry up.
Contents: Mislabeled Bottle
So, you're saying libertarians are moderates? Who wish only for an appropriate amount of regulation?
Bullshit.
There's no actual treatment of flu.
There are a vast array of treatments.
There is, however no cure.
Red China again
And I thought all that stores were honest, really, really. A unicorn and a kitten must have drop dead right away now. Honestly, are not people retards buying that kind of stuff from unknown places? Does really a store hopes to have my business spamming my email account and my browsing experience with NOISE? Dream on.
I honestly can't think of an industry with more to gain from spreading fear, uncertainty and doubt than the pharmaceutical industry. Can you?
Yep, the defense industry and politicians. Want to sell weapons? FUD is your best ally. Want to pass civil-rights abusing legislation? FUD.
I'm not going to "define" over regulation for you, but I'll venture to describe the criteria we should strive to meet with regulations and government.
Government is/was intended to be as small as possible and the least intrusive as possible. Government and regulation are both necessary evils and we should error on the side of smaller, less intrusive.
You see, the mindset that government/regulation is the solution to ANY and all problems is wrong headed. It is not government that makes this country great but the individual striving for a better life though innovation and hard work that did that. We seem to have a default setting that government has to "do something" about things like this, when it really should be individuals who solve the problem. When you start your thinking with "There aught to be a law that prevents this!" you've already set foot on the wrong path because you cannot legislate morality by making a law. What you *should* say is "How irresponsible of that person, how short sighted to cheat his/her customers" and we should then let the market take care of it because they just gave somebody else, who won't be dishonest, an opening to take their business away.
So in this case, having a fair court system and applying existing "truth in advertising laws" is all that is necessary.... We don't need the government involved in writing new regulations...
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
Look, nobody wants overregulation. Everybody wants government and regulation to be as small as practical, given the duties, requirements, and responsibilities thereof. People differ a lot on what said duties, requirements, and responsibilities are. A Libertarian is either an anarchist (there are some) or somebody who believes government should be restricted to very few fields (military, police, and courts are some popular ones). A liberal typically wants the government to assume more responsibilities, and regulate appropriately.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
I think the difference between "conservative" and "Liberal" is their philosophical approach to solving problems. The liberal says "the government should fix that problem" and the conservative says "how can the market fix this and how can I help?" If your first response to a problem is to ask for new regulations or programs from your government, you are liberal. If you look for ways for people to solve problems on their own first, you are a conservative.
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
So it's great that the retail companies are taking these things off their shelves. It's even better that companies like WMT reach out to their vendors to clear things up. Thanks!... to the FDA and to the retailers.
But wouldn't it be very very very useful if the FDA lists the names of those offending products? Cuz there are a lot of innocent consumers who have already brought the products... they need to know these product names so that they can get rid of them.
Herbal medicine != homeopathy
Herbal medicine is the root of modern medicine, and most modern medicines are just herbal remedies that have had the shit refined out of them.
Conflating the two does nobody any favours.
Even dogs know this!
Dogs with upset stomach will seek out and devour mint plants.
If an individual did this, they'd be arrested and dragged into court (correct me if I'm wrong, this is just what I would expect if I did that myself). Multiply the scale by 10,000 though, and the businesses involved get not even a fine but... a cease-and-desist letter?
Could someone please explain to me - omitting the-world-is-going-to-hell screed - why we tend to prosecute small crimes so much more aggressively than the large ones?
There is so much profit in supplements, there should be a nice, fat judgment against these fucktards. Set an example.
Wow there certainly is a lot of malice here in regards to people's attitudes towards herbal supplements. Check out http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pu... and read up on the efficacy of various herbal supplements. There is a big difference between homeopathic and herbal supplements. Some herbal supplements do actually have noticeable and measurable benefits and often minimal side effects. A lot of extracts are where the efficacy shows. Many extracts are standardized for a certain amount of desired active constituents. You just have to use a reputable brand and find a product that works for what you need. There isn't an herbal cure for everything, but there are a lot that will help treat or prevent certain conditions For example there are are quite a few herbal extracts that can help with diabetes, such as certain strains of cinnamon extract, or gymnema sylvestre (both which have been shown to be significantly beneficial in scientific trials).I just recommended boswellia serrata extract for my Uncle for his arthritis, he started taking it a few days ago and has already noticed significant relief. Then there is peppermint oil as another posted mentioned for IBS.
I would also like to point out that not everyone who believes in the efficacy of some herbal supplements is against modern medicine or is some kind of all-organic-consuming naturalist. I just wanted to make a point that there is a huge difference between homeopathic (placebo dilution), and herbal extracts and supplements.I hope this sort of scandal doesn't make it any harder to sell and purchase herbal supplements, but rather just points out the frauds and could potentially show who is true from analyzing their products.
Your Momma's so fat she makes emacs look like nano!
That's a no true Scotsman fallacy. As you can see in this (http://science.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=6896323&cid=48972113) the Libertarian party thinks regulation to prevent fraud is fine.