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10 May 2016:
The Natural Health Products Bill: An
Extraordinary Assault on Healthy Food
The Natural
Health Products Bill is set to cause confusion in the food
market place. Dr Guy Hatchard who is preparing a legal
challenge to the Bill, advises that ambiguities between the
Food Act, the Medicines Act, the Dietary Supplements
Regulations and the Natural Health Products Bill will cause
confusion in the healthy food market place and lead to
litigation.
Since the food bill precludes any health claim
being made for a food and the NHP Bill by definition will be
regulating any product/food claiming to be healthy, the
effect of the Bill will be to ensure that any healthy
food/product will be regulated while any unhealthy food can
continue to be sold free of regulation.
Why will tobacco,
sugar, suspect food additives, alcohol, artificial
sweeteners, preservatives, and highly processed
non-nutritious foods all escape the Natural Health Products
Bill, while healthy remedies and common foods such as Aloe
Vera, Cardamon, Betel Nut, Neem, Mustard, Tea, Coconut,
Almond, Castor Oil, Tamarind, Valerian, and Grape will all
be regulated and effectively taxed by an army of civil
servants at the Ministry of Health? The annual budget at the
Therapeutic Goods Authority in Australia which as a similar
role to the Authority proposed under the NHP Bill has annual
budget of $170 million which is paid through levies on the
industry who also have to pay additional costs well in
excess of this to meet the regulations. All this cost will
be ultimately borne by the NZ consumer and will push up the
cost of healthy foods and products while leaving the cost of
unhealthy food unaffected. How ill-advised is that?
The
Government is planning to tax and restrict healthy food and
products which will encourage consumption of unhealthy
foods. All this vast regulatory over reach is being
introduced for no reason that the government has been able
to substantiate. There is vague talk of protecting the
public from risk but no evidence of risk from healthy foods
has been presented by the government.
In fact it is the
other way around, there is a huge body of evidence that
unhealthy foods are contributing to an epidemic of diabetes,
obesity, heart disease and cancer. These huge proven risks
are being ignored, while the Government regulates a sector
where there has been no evidence of any risk and a great
deal of published research of benefits.
So why is this
happening? I made a presentation in the late 90’s to the
Ministry of Health Committee on new health initiatives
concerning a well researched natural method to improve
general health which is supported by the NIH in USA. I
presented published studies from private health insurers and
the Canadian health system which recorded a 50% reduction in
doctor visits and reduced incidence of a wide range of
diseases including heart disease, our number one killer.
After the talk I was taken aside by the committee
chairman and politely informed NZ doctors would never adopt
this because it would reduce their income. Is this is an
isolated attitude? Unfortunately no, read new best selling
book “The Prime” by Dr Kulreet Chaudhary, a renowned San
Diego Neurologist who reports the same reaction from her
colleagues when she found her patients recovered using the
same natural methods I was advocating.
Viewed in this
light, it seems that the NHP Bill could be a perverse and
misguided attempt by medical professionals, health
bureaucrats, and pharmaceutical advocates to protect their
financial interests by stifling alternative approaches to
health care which would benefit everyone.
There are sound
scientific reasons to oppose at this absurd, out-dated, and
unfair
Bill.
ends
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