Recently in Codex Category

www.opednews.com

May 20, 2009
by Lord Rudi C. Loehwing

Codex Alimentarius – Translation: "Food Code" Originally envisioned and designed by what became the most ruthless and inhumane of 20th century Western European regimes, Codex Alimentarius (Codex) was later organized and officiated mainly by members of an emerging pharmaceutical industry spawned by that very same source.

In its near half-century of existence Codex has emerged as the self-proclaimed international authority on food and nutrition. Intent on dictating or significantly influencing international health and nutritional policies and legislation, and backed by international trade agreements and the United Nations, Codex has done much to accomplish unimpeded protection of chemical and pharmaceutical interests on a global scale – much to the detriment of sustainable health and nutrition. While there are approximately 30 committees under the banner of Codex, the pharmaceutical industry's focus is mainly within the "Codex Committee on Nutrition and Foods for Special Dietary Uses." The committee's actions and published materials give the impression that their view of the natural health industry is as "an unwanted competitor" as opposed to that of an "adjunct" as it is viewed in the emergent integrated medicine industry.

Vitaminespress.com
By Michael leVesque

Perception is everything. So let's look at the influences that help determine it.

Medicine is based upon observation, as the French Philosopher Michel Foucault stated in The Birth of the Clinic, when describing the medical profession.

Observation is Perception

For years the wealthy in northern Europe ate off pewter plates, which have a very high lead content. Tomatoes are very acidic and when placed in contact with the pewter they leached out the lead. When eaten, the tomatoes then produced lead poisoning. Lead poisoning manifests itself in many ways from headaches to delirium to death. Based upon perception tomatoes were considered poisonous in those regions for several hundred years by society and the medical community until the 19th Century when a merchant publicly ate a bushel of tomatoes to prove they were harmless without ill effects.

OpEdNews
April 7, 2009
By Marti Oakley

Looming in our Congress are several bills dedicated to the creation of a yet another bureaucracy which will be used to facilitate the usurping of US laws, standards and regulations in deference to international agreements and global committee edicts.

At stake here is what has been the most dynamic and productive agricultural system ever known….and the most safe. Our congress has decided that preserving this system and allowing it to continue is not beneficial to corporate AG nor to the continued compliance relating to non-US laws and regulations.

Atlanticfreepress
Written by Robert Singer
February 7, 2009

The Codex Alimentarius Commission (CAC), based in Rome, Italy, is an international organization jointly created in 1962 by the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) and the World Health Organization (WHO) of the United Nations “allegedly” to protect the health of consumers with guidelines for food standards.

Codex Alimentarius may present the greatest disaster for our food supply — and thus for our health — this country has ever seen, and if not stopped is likely to be implemented starting in 2011.

Let me repeat that, the greatest disaster to our health if not stopped, starting in 2011.

The Codex and regulations affecting our food sovereignty go back to 1962. Fortunately, in 1994 Congress passed the Dietary Supplements Health and Education Act (DSHEA), which for the moment preserved the definition of vitamins, minerals and herbs as foods.

Without congressional oversight the U.S. will move towards Canada and Mexico where supplements are considered drugs, not foods. Codex if implemented will reverse DSHEA and the U.S. will no longer treat dietary supplements as foods, but as toxins.

Let me repeat that, Codex treats foods as toxins!

"There is a huge shift taking place in the global awareness in the last 5 years with strong views about globalization and the power structures of major corporations."
David Korten

Codex Alimentarius, according to its website, was created in 1963 by the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) and the World Health Organization (WHO) to develop food standards, guidelines and related texts such as codes of practice under the Joint FAO/WHO Food Standards Program. The stated purposes of this Program are protecting the health of consumers, ensuring fair trade practices and promoting coordination of food standards.

At first sight, that seems a worthwhile goal. Unfortunately, the nice words hide a more sinister reality.

Codex Alimentarius is an industry-sponsored international legislative forum that promotes corporate interests in a globalized market, rather than consumer health and fair trade.

Until a decade ago, few had ever heard of Codex Alimentarius, unless they were directly involved in working out its standards or in making sure their country changed laws and procedures to comply with Codex rules - but that changed...

NewsWithViews.com
By Byron J. Richards, CCN
May 29, 2008

The brotherhood of Big Pharma’s weight loss cartel is taking direct aim at your health freedom and natural options to help you lose weight. They have submitted a petition to the FDA requesting that all claims that dietary supplements promote, assist, or otherwise help in weight loss are disease claims. The goal is to eliminate competition for dietician services, drugs, and surgery in the multi-billion dollar weight loss industry. It is a blatant attack on health freedom and free commerce – a significant threat that the Big Pharma-friendly FDA is sure to seriously consider.

Immediate consumer action is needed. Steps to take are provided at the end of this article. Defeating this Big Pharma proposal will require an all out grassroots consumer effort. Various health freedom organizations such as the National Health Federation and Citizens for Health have already taken the lead in this effort.

This specific attack is part of an overall campaign in which the FDA plays a major negative role, seeking to reduce your access to dietary supplements. The FDA is actively participating on an international basis (CODEX) and regional basis (FDA Trilateral Cooperation Charter/SPP/North American Union) to circumvent existing U.S. laws (DSHEA) so as to undermine your access to natural health options. In the face of this current attack even the Council for Responsible Nutrition (CRN), who often comes down on the wrong side of regional and international health freedom issues, has stated that it will vigorously defend the dietary supplement industry’s legal right to make factual weight loss claims.

March 4, 2008
www.eu-referendum.org

Six non-governmental organizations (NGOs), collectively representing consumers from all 27 European Union (EU) countries, today announced the official launch of a campaign for citizens to have the right to vote in referendums whenever significant changes to laws affecting them are made at either national or European level. In particular, they are demanding that all EU citizens should immediately be given the opportunity to vote in referendums on the Lisbon Treaty.

Arguing that the EU is increasingly favouring the interests of big business over those of its own citizens, the six organizations say that unless this situation is reversed and European citizens are given the right to be directly involved in political decision-making, the European political system will rapidly degenerate into a dictatorship where democracy, freedom of choice and the privacy rights of individuals are routinely violated.

Paul Anthony Taylor, External Relations Director of the Dr. Rath Health Foundation and the campaign’s coordinator, said: “Last November, for the thirteenth year in a row, the EU’s auditors refused to sign off its financial accounts citing errors of legality and presumed attempts at fraud. Then, only two weeks ago, EU politicians were openly accused of fraud and embezzlement on a massive scale and an official investigation was launched that could potentially lead to the imprisonment of a number of MEPs. Corruption, fraud and an overall lack of accountability are becoming increasingly rife amongst the European Union’s political elite and it is clearly time that ordinary citizens are given a direct say in the way that the EU is developing. Simply giving people one vote every four or five years - to elect their political representatives - is not nearly enough in any political system that still professes to be a democracy.”

HEALTHY BODIES ARE NO GOOD TO BIG PHARMA
by Beldeu Singh*

Can your politician save you from the agenda and designs of Big Pharma? Will your health authorities bother to understand their designs and stand for your health interests?

I do not think so.

They have too much money to throw around and they have in some cases conspired to create organizations to front for them. They have been very successful in getting more and more toxic chemicals into human bodies in the name of treatment. Some of these chemicals are only marginally more effective than placebos, giving rise to the very good prospect of placebo therapy. No one has bothered to consider this, even though a placebo costs a tiny fraction compared to the drug and it comes with a bonus – no side effects.

Preventive medicine based on nutrition and high antioxidant intake from food sources does not seem to interest anyone except the science-literate consumer because healthy bodies do not contribute to the bottom-line of Big Pharma. On the other hand, toxic drugs, once they are legally categorized as medications, can create side-effects to be treated by more drugs that impact their bottom-lines positively. It is a gravely vicious cycle nurtured through a “cosy” relationship between Big Pharma and the regulatory authorities.

Officials have become so adversarial to ensuring health benefits that they have issued statements to the effect that doctors must only give pharmaceutical benefits to their patients and not health benefits. And, quite naturally, the number of deaths and hospitalizations from adverse drug reactions is increasing every year. But banning toxic drugs for therapy is out of the question. The system has many supporters and these people are in a position to ask for bans on clinical nutrition and to press for those in order to promote their business interests through legislation. Those ridiculous laws and legal definitions will help to stifle the application of nutrition and edible herbs to promote health and for use in therapy unless they are sold by Big Pharma!

The FDA would also like to harmonize our dietary supplement laws with the evolving international standards set by Codex, thus branding therapeutic nutrition as dangerous and risky and needing to be sold by Big Pharma or removed from the market altogether (if it competes with a blockbuster category of drugs). Codex is planning to use the same proteomics and biomarker technology that will be used by the FDA’s Critical Path Initiative to remove therapeutic dietary supplements from the international market and force their policies on America, thereby superseding the sovereignty of American law on threat of trade sanctions. The FDA fully supports draconian Codex guidelines to regulate dietary supplements and is working with the Germans to concoct technology to brand nutrients as drugs. (Life Extension Foundation as quoted in: Health Supreme, Oct 15, 2007, Codex Alimentarius: Will EU Laws Become World Standard).

The law can define animals as traffic as in the Road Traffic Acts in commonwealth countries. It can be used to distort and warp the natural order of things and a definition can be introduced to even say that vitamin C from fruits is a drug. Where will it all stop? If selling fruits is lucrative, the business can be put in the hands of Big Pharma, by changing the legal definitions. Anything that can be consumed that benefits health, whether it is a supplement or food or anything edible can be redefined in such a way as to make it a business solely of Big Pharma. If it makes money, it can be turned into a monopoly or controlled by changing the legal definitions.

Pharma has embarked on a dirty game because their drugs are not getting any better; they are getting more toxic. And more and more research is showing that these drugs do not work within the natural and healthy biochemistry to provide a health benefit. Hence, the Big Pharma producers are working hard to press for laws and regulations to ensure pharmaceutical benefits instead of health benefits. Let’s examine the issue of competition from natural medicine, clinical nutrition, ayurveda and their therapeutic and health benefits that improve quality of life or help to slow down the progression of degenerative conditions. This competition can be killed by legally defining nutrients as drugs so that only pharmaceutical companies can sell them. This becomes all the more critical for them to do as more and more people realize that drugs are D-form chemicals that cause harm in the mammalian L-form biochemistry. Many of these drugs disrupt healthy biochemical pathways by blocking the formation of the ATP molecule or the formation of antioxidant enzymes in the body. They deplete mitochondrial DNA in cells and stores of minerals in the body especially copper, manganese, zinc and iron. Those minerals work catalytically with the glutathione-catalase system to convert hydrogen peroxide produced by the cells’ metabolism into water and oxygen, a critical function for maintaining and restoring health. They also deplete magnesium or otherwise suppress your immune system. Some drugs that aim to deliver a pharmaceutical benefit, for example to reduce blood glucose levels by blocking the conversion of lipids into glucose, may end up altering the blood lipid profile, thereby creating a new risk for the patient especially if the patient’s antioxidant intake and consumption of soluble fiber through foods is low.

Many drugs generate free radicals in the body. Sometimes these dangers can be easily seen in diabetic patients with diabetic wounds who are given antibiotics resulting in blood sugar levels rising to double the original readings (eg from a reading of 7-9 going up to 16-18). On the other hand, Big Pharma companies are working to rebrand their toxic drugs and poisons into “well-tolerated” medications that somehow over time become “non-poisonous” or “cures” or are advertised to sound like supplements.

Would medical science prescribe a cancer causing drug to cancer patients? Last March, the U.S. federal government issued an unusually detailed alert to the nation’s 5.5 million health care workers: The powerful drugs used in chemotherapy can themselves cause cancer and pose a risk to nurses, pharmacists and others who handle them (The Washington Post, Tuesday, February 15, 2005; Page HE01, Jim Morris). Chemotherapy drugs in human and animal studies have shown they have the potential to cause cancer or reproductive problems, said Thomas Connor, a research biologist with the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH).

Chemo-drugs, like radiation, generate huge amounts of the highly reactive hydroxyl radical that damages cell membranes and disrupts the electron transport system in cells as well as protein synthesis. Natural enzyme and micronutrient levels drop rapidly and that accelerates cell death. Such a new surge of free radicals is generated by chemo-drugs which are cytotoxic to cancer cells as well as normal cells. Thus many young normal cells die due to the treatment. Most of the known carcinogens, including benzene and at least 40 other toxic chemicals in cigarette smoke and pesticides generate free radicals that create oxidative stress in cells, impairing their aerobic respiration or damaging DNA and mitochondrial DNA, turning them into cancer cells. It is this very same toxicity that is common to carcinogens and chemotherapy-drugs. Hence the NOISH alert really comes as no surprise (see: Dangerous Philosophy of treatment in Medical Science).

How much control do they want? That depends on what and how the substance will impact the bottom-line.

"Britain is reviewing the laws on the regulation of tailored herbal treatments, but Dr Canter wants them banned, even at the risk of a backlash from Chinese or Indian communities. In some countries doctors practice phytotherapy, which uses extracts from a single plant and closely follows the principles of pharmacology" (see: Health Supreme, Oct 15, 2007, Codex Alimentarius: Will EU Laws Become World Standard).

So phytotherapy, using "extracts from a single plant" that "closely follow the principles of pharmacology" is all right, while individual attention from a herbalist is outright dangerous. If you recommend a glass juice made of orange plus carrot plus red spinach with a spoon of coconut oil and if the health of the person improves and they also lose some fat, well there you go…it is a drug! Can you see how Codex is slowly taking control of your kitchen?

There is another grave danger. While allopathic medicine is moving towards individual customization, they want to take that principle away from nutritional interventions. Developments and research in therapeutic approaches that improve or restore health will be stifled, if the principles of pharmacology are adopted as the only way to treat diseases and degenerative conditions in the human body. The mammalian biological system does not use pharmacological principles in generating an immune response or to activate cells that target pathogens or cancer cells, or in the production of antibodies or anti-pathogenic proteins such perforin, and neither in the repair of genetic material. When you legally only provide for pharmacological principles, you only create more drugs to be put into the human body. Such a law goes against the natural health processes of the human biological system. It only works towards the bottom-line of pharmaceutical companies at the expense of health. Society and its productivity is dependent on health, not on the number of drugs or the amount of pharmaceutical benefit one gets. When a system of law is put in place that makes pharmacological principles the only system of treatment, we can say good bye to the use of an orange or a lemon to cure scurvy. By then, it will be too good to own a pharmaceutical company but too late for mankind.

By then codex would have given full control of all home remedies and your kitchen and orchard to Big Pharma. Can we change the course of the engines that are steaming in this direction? Big Pharma can bank roll what they choose and all you have is a deaf or illiterate congressman or parliamentarian. Bear in mind that lobbies against health have been very successful. Take for instance, coconut oil – your doctor or even your consultant dietician may tell you that it is bad for your heart because it contains cholesterol!

The point is that governments are no longer in control of health as the pharmaceutical agenda to promote pharmaceutical benefits is spreading like a bad cancer. Greed has become their god.

NewsWithViews.com

By Byron J. Richards, CCN

January 9, 2008

The New Year brings a surprise for the FDA – a lawsuit filed by Public Citizen seeking to force the FDA to do its pretended job of protecting American citizens from the dangers of drugs. Of course, the real FDA job, as prioritized by top FDA management, is to protect the sales of Big Pharma and create new market opportunities for Big Pharma and Big Biotech while using Americans for experimental purposes.

The current suit revolves around the dangers of toxic fluoride-containing antibiotics. The two brand names involved are Johnson & Johnson’s Levaquin and Bayer’s Cipro. The German company, Bayer, has a long and colorful history of injuring Americans while its executives laugh all the way to the bank.

PRESS RELEASE of the National Health Federation

Codex Meeting in Germany Set to Decide Future for
Vitamin Consumers Around the World
November 12, 2007

The U.S.-based National Health Federation (NHF), the world’s longest-standing international health-freedom organisation, is today beginning a week of meetings at the 29th session of the Codex Committee on Nutrition and Foods for Special Dietary Uses (CCNFSDU) in Bad Neuenahr, Germany. Expected to be attended by over 300 delegates, observers and advisors, representing about 70 member countries and over 30 international organizations, the Committee, sponsored by the Food & Agriculture Organization and World Health Organization, is the world’s highest international body setting global standards and guidelines on nutrition

With consumer members all over the world, and a Board of Governors and Advisory Board containing representatives from six countries, the NHF is unique as being the only consumer health-freedom organization in the world to enjoy official observer delegate status at Codex. The NHF therefore has the opportunity to make representations on behalf of natural health interests all over the world, which are presently being threatened by over-regulation stimulated by spurious science, misinformed media attacks and corporate pressure from large food and pharmaceutical concerns.

NewsWithViews.com
By Byron J. Richards, CCN
June 27, 2007

The FDA, emboldened by its transformation into a drug company, has embarked upon an anti-American plan of interfering with business and intentionally eliminating various dietary supplement companies from the market. The FDA announcement came on Friday, June 22, 2007 under the guise of a final rule for dietary supplement good manufacturing practices (CGMPs). Within this 800 page rule the FDA states, “We find that this final rule will have a significant economic impact on a substantial number of small entities.... Establishments with above average costs, and even establishments with average costs, could be hard pressed to continue to operate. Some of these may decide it is too costly and either change product lines or go out of business.... 140 very small [less than 20 employees] and 32 small dietary supplement manufacturers [less than 500 employees] will be at risk of going out of business.... costs per establishment are proportionally higher for very small than for large establishments....The regulatory costs of this final rule will also discourage new small businesses from entering the industry.”

Dr. Rath Health Alliance

Today, on June 21, 2007, is the 10th anniversary of the Chemnitz program. On to 21, 1997, I had given my first major presentation in Europe - in the City Hall of the German town Chemnitz.

This talk marked not only the beginning of our work in Europe, but was also important for another reason: for the first time in history, someone dared to name the pharmaceutical industry as what it is - an industry that is thriving on the promotion of diseases.

Amazingly, never before the sobering analysis had been made publicly that the pharmaceutical industry - the very industry that for decades had built a worldwide monopoly as the "exclusive purveyor of health" - that this very industry is the biggest obstacle to achieve human health!

NewsWithViews.com
By Byron J. Richards, CCN
June 14, 2007

Under the false pretense of improved food and drug safety the FDA is re-inventing itself as a kingpin drug company. This charade has so far hoodwinked virtually all members of Congress. The Senate has already approved this FDA transformation. The House will bring similar legislation out of committee next week, with a vote in the full House likely in July. The measure will then go to a conference committee to work out the differences. The final chapter in this transformation occurs when the Reagan-Udall Foundation for the FDA becomes law, which is scheduled to happen some time before September 30, 2007.

NewsWithViews.com
By Byron J. Richards, CCN
June 14, 2007

This year, Kennedy and Enzi tacked this piece of legislation onto required FDA funding, lumping numerous FDA issues into one huge bill (S.1082) and telling everyone it is a safety bill. Within this new legislation is the creation of the Reagan-Udall Foundation for the FDA, set up as an independent non-profit Foundation that will be under the control of the FDA. The Senate fought bitterly over various drug-safety issues unrelated to the Reagan-Udall Foundation, as if these issues acted as a smoke screen to slip past members of the Senate the creation of the Reagan-Udall Foundation for the FDA, the von Eschenbach dream come true.

By Byron J. Richards, CCN
May 16, 2007
NewsWithViews.com

Senators were taken off guard by the public outrage over the passing of bill S.1082 with language that can be used to seriously harass dietary supplements by enabling the FDA to apply drug-related risk analysis to the safety of food and food ingredients (and thus dietary supplements). Senators are also struggling to defend the fact they enabled the creation of the Reagan-Udall Foundation for the FDA, having been conned into believing this foundation was for the purpose of improved safety when in fact its mission is to assist the FDA to develop the next generation of drugs with drastically reduced safety or effectiveness testing. These issues are fully explained in Part 1 of this article, if you would like to know the details in greater depth.

May 11, 2007
By Stephen Fox

Never before in Human History has food chemistry been so precarious and so critical to the health of billions. This results from multinational corporate biochemical mayhem going unchecked by regulatory bodies in every nation, the worst two being the United States Food and Drug Administration and Chinas total lack of standards. This crisis is worsening, demonstrated by the FDA failing to discern the imported melamine from China in the wheat and rice gluten additive to pet food that has already killed at least 4000 pets, and the failure to prevent imports of diethylene glycol, the fake glycerine from China added to medications as a sweetener, which has killed hundreds, especially children, from Panama to India to Bangladesh.

NewsWithViews.com
By Byron J. Richards, CCN
May 15, 2007

Your right to have free access to safe and highly effective dietary supplements is under an intense multi-pronged FDA attack. On May 14, 2007 the Supreme Court sided with the FDA by deciding not to hear the case of Nutraceutical v FDA, letting stand a federal appeals court ruling that permits the FDA to use drug-related risk/benefit analysis to determine if a nutrient is safe. This is the exact same point the FDA is trying to get put into law through Senate bill S.1082 and HR.1561, which consumers have flooded the Senate on over the past few weeks. And it is the same point the FDA is seeking to help implement on an international basis through Codex. The Supreme Court denial to hear this case is a dramatic turn of events that means there is very little time left to act to preserve free access to dietary supplements. The first part of this article explains this issue in depth so that Americans can understand what is taking place. The second part explains the steps Americans need to take to preserve their health freedom.

By Byron J. Richards, CCN
May 4, 2007
NewsWithViews.com

There is still time to stop FDA, Inc.

Bill S1082 is a bill that helps fund the FDA with Big Pharma money. It is known all over Capital Hill as Big Pharma-designed legislation. It is running into all sorts of credibility problems. A vote is likely on Monday – delayed due to all the opposition flooding the Senate by “we the people.”

NewsWithViews.com
By Byron J. Richards, CCN
April 30, 2007

S1082 Update – Tuesday’s Activity. Fight Erupts on Senate floor:

As the Senate continues to debate the Big Pharma-friendly sweeping reform of the FDA a new problem for Big Pharma’s prize Senators has erupted and quickly turned into confrontation on the floor of the Senate. At stake is at least 10 billion dollars per year in exorbitant Big Pharma profits. In one corner is Big Pharma-puppet Orrin Hatch (R-UT), representing the Kennedy/Enzi drug cartel. In the other corner is a majority of Senators lead by Byron Dorgan (D-ND).

By Byron J. Richards, CCN
April 5, 2007
NewsWithViews.com

Americans are up in arms that our pets are being injured and killed by a toxin sent to America by a Chinese company. Melamine, a toxic fertilizer used in China, is the suspected culprit behind the deaths and injuries to potentially hundreds of thousands of our pets. The FDA assures us that this toxin has not entered the human food supply – does anyone believe in the competence of the FDA? It is only a matter of time before this type of problem happens to humans, as the inept FDA has no control over imported food intended for humans, let alone pets.

Melamine was used to help grow wheat, a practice that is legal in China and illegal in the U.S. This poison ended up in wheat gluten used as a protein source and thickening agent in pet food. Why were all these pet food companies, many claiming to be producers of fine quality pet food, buying wheat gluten from China when the U.S. is one of the top producers of wheat in the world? These companies sacrificed the health of your pet to make a profit, buying the cheapest source of wheat gluten they could find. This is the new way of the global economy, find the cheapest price and forget about health implications.

Alliance for Natural Health
By the ANH team
5 March 2007

Last week we saw headlines around the world that told people that 'vitamins kill'. ANH provides insight into how, it would appear, the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) resorted to massaging previous studies to stop people taking vitamins.

On 28th February we saw headlines around the world once again condemning vitamin supplements. The stimulus? A Serbian doctor, Goran Bjelakovic, who was involved in an earlier canning job on vitamins – in 2004 on vitamin supplements for reducing risk of gastrointestinal cancers (Lancet 2004; 364: 1219–28) – somehow found himself doing it all over again. This time he published in the US-based Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA). On both occasions, his papers triggered headlines around the world which appeared to have just one purpose: getting people to stop taking vitamin supplements.

NewsTarget.com
February 28 2007
by Mike Adams

The latest round in conventional medicine's ongoing attempts to discredit (and ultimately outlaw) nutritional supplements is found in a highly questionable study published this week in the Journal of the American Medical Association, which claims that vitamins actually increase the risk of death.

The study claims to have analyzed a collection of previous studies on Vitamin A, beta carotene, Vitamin C, Vitamin E and selenium, concluding that most of the nutrients are actually dangerous to human health. Of course, this is research from conventional medicine – an industry that promotes patented chemicals as perfectly safe, even though FDA-approved pharmaceuticals are killing 100,000 Americans each year. (Imagine the uproar if vitamins killed even a fraction of that number…)

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Orthomolecular Medicine News Service
February 27, 2007

(OMNS, Feb 27, 2007) Over a twenty-three year period, vitamins have been connected with the deaths of a total of ten people in the United States. Poison control statistics confirm that more Americans die each year from eating soap than from taking vitamins.

Where are the bodies?
A 23-year review of US poison control center annual reports (1) tells a remarkable and largely ignored story: vitamins are extraordinarily safe.

Annual deaths alleged from vitamins:

By Byron J. Richards, CCN
February 21, 2007
NewsWithViews.com

On February 13, 2007 the House Energy and Commerce Committee’s Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations opened hearings lambasting the FDA regarding the safety of drugs. The opening statement by Chairman John Dingell (D-MI) set the tone, “It is clear … that the FDA is badly broken. I expect that before we finish this investigation, which is just getting underway, we will discover whether the problems we have found are due to the work of scoundrels, irrational penny-pinching, or because the doors to the FDA “hen house” have been thrown open to foxes. It may be a combination of all three.”

National Health Federation
PRESS RELEASE
February 15, 2007

A Report on the February 2007 Oslo Codex Working Group on GM Labelling

At a recent two-day meeting in Oslo, Norway, a sizeable group of delegates met to discuss establishing international Codex Guidelines for disclosing on food-product labels whether or not a food was genetically modified (GM). Amazingly enough, a number of important countries’ delegates argued that consumers were not smart enough to understand and handle such information. Ignorance is bliss, they essentially claimed.

By Byron J. Richards, CCN
February 9, 2007
NewsWithViews.com

The FDA is steamrolling its way to a grand vision of repressive health care based on profits for Big Pharma and new biotech companies at the expense of human health.

Human death means little to the FDA, permitting mass killings of Americans while protecting Big Pharma profits. This year the FDA is being given more money (federal funding up 5% to 1.5 billion) without any accountability or effective Congressional oversight. This means that instead of using the money to meaningfully improve drug safety, the FDA will carry on its pet projects that include forwarding the health component of the Bush administration’s North American Union, limiting health freedom by harassing dietary supplement companies so as to reduce access to safe and effective drug competition, and actively turning the FDA into a drug company.

By Byron J. Richards, CCN
February 9, 2007
NewsWithViews.com

Health Care for Profit

Wall Street, international bankers, President Bush, pharmaceutical companies, new biotech companies, the Rockefeller empire, and the FDA have created a new plan for public health. It is a grand vision based on profit. It will use the FDA and, as needed, the Department of Homeland Security as the regulatory police force that ensures compliance in the name of public safety. Legitimate objections may be overpowered in the name of national security.

Michael Bending of the Australian Health Freedom Alliance alerts both Australians and New Zealanders that relative freedom to obtain nutrient supplements is on its way out down under. The project of a TransTasman Joint Health Agency, meant to extend the rather restrictive Australian system to its smaller neighbour and thereby close a loophole through which Australians are able to obtain certain healthy products that are formally prohibited in their country, is making its way through the New Zealand legislature. Here is Michael's warning and alert:

The NZ Government is trying to change the way in which all Natural Health Products (NHPs) are regulated. They plan to treat Natural Health Products as drugs and give the power to control them to the controversial Australian Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA).

Needless to say, the NZ natural health industry has never had an adverse or negative report with regards to a natural health product. The risks connected with nutritional health products are negligible.

So why is the Australian TGA and the NZ Labour Party trying to make New Zealanders more safe than safe? The answer is obviously more money and a protected market for the big drug companies.

The New Zealand Government has called for submissions with regards to the Therapeutic Products and Medicines Bill 2006. This bill seeks to eventually pave the way for the Joint Trans Tasman Treaty (JTA) in which the Australian TGA will set itself up as the regulatory body for both NZ and Aust.

The NZ Labour Party are hoping that they will hear only glowing submissions rather than adverse views, in this regard the NZ Labour party can use the favourable submissions from all the big health businesses and drug companies to push their agenda in the NZ Parliament.

It does not matter if you are a NZ resident or an Australian resident, you can still make a submission to the NZ Government Administration Committee. If you are Australian tell them what life is like under the restrictive TGA banner.

We know that this JTA carries a legal frame work that obligates Australia and NZ to conform to international treaties, this in effect obliges us to harmonise to any Codex standards in the future. On a global basis, Codex seeks to make many natural health products illegal or reclassified as drugs, as well as reducing allowable dosages. For more Codex info: http://www.ahf-au.org/

We know that the Australian regulatory system is so top heavy that it favours the bigger companies, as only the bigger companies can afford the red tape and regulatory procedures required to market a natural health product.

In Australia we know that we can source from NZ many health products that are illegal in Australia - why are they illegal in Australia? If NZ goes ahead with the JTA then these products will no doubt be illegal in NZ too, is this the sort of health industry NZ wants and needs? Australia doesn't need it either but unfortunately we already have it by virtue of political manoeuvring by the drug companies and Government in the 1980's.

It doesn't matter if you are a business or and individual, NZ'nder or Australian, please make a submission to the NZ Government Administration Committee and tell them that we do not what the JTA and we do not want the Therapeutic Products and Medicines Bill. Dec 2006 passed in the NZ Parliament.

The closing date for submissions is Wednesday, 7 February 2007. Please make a concerted effort and send your submission. For more Information on your submission, David Sloan from the NZ Health Trust has a web page outlining the procedures.

Michael Bending 
Alliance for Health Freedom Australia  

By Greg Ciola
January 18, 2007
NewsWithViews.com

According to Byron Richards, the FDA is out-of-control. It is a bully police force standing up for the profits of drug companies at the expense of health for Americans. It has far exceeded any legislative mandate and is blatantly involved in an abuse of Constitutional power.

In this eye opening interview, the FDA’s deceptions and drug-company profit schemes are revealed and the scam of the sickness industry is made clear. Health freedom is under attack and this interview will help arm you with invaluable information that you can use to take charge of your health.

The New York Times
nytimes.com
December 18, 2006
By ALEX BERENSON

Eli Lilly encouraged primary care physicians to use Zyprexa, a powerful drug for schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, in patients who did not have either condition, according to internal Lilly marketing materials.

The marketing documents, given to The New York Times by a lawyer representing mentally ill patients, detail a multiyear promotional campaign that Lilly began in Orlando, Fla., in late 2000. In the campaign, called Viva Zyprexa, Lilly told its sales representatives to suggest that doctors prescribe Zyprexa to older patients with symptoms of dementia.

Christopher Barr
Naturally Speaking
December 18, 2006

Mourning freedom's early morning loss

Does this nation have a war on drugs or are drugs at war with this nation? This question concluded last week’s column. The answer was clearly given by Congressional cowards while most all of America slept after 3 a.m. in the early morning hours of 12/09/06.

Late in the evening of the day that last week’s column was written there was a bill passed stealthily by the United States Senate without a vote being taken. This was accomplished through a parliamentary maneuver that was also a paramilitary maneuver for the war of drugs against this nation.

By Byron J. Richards, CCN
December 5, 2006
NewsWithViews.com

Today I received an e-mail from the Natural Products Association (NPA) asking me to support the Dietary Supplement and Non-Prescription Drug Consumer Protection Act (the “AER bill”). Apparently they do not know I am one of the most outspoken critics of this legislation. I have already posted two articles on this topic for NWV, one in July and one in November. The NPA, formerly the NNFA (National Nutritional Foods Association), is the largest trade association for ingredient suppliers and health food stores. This group, along with CRN (the Council for Responsible Nutrition) has been taken over by Big Pharma and is selling out the supplement industry.

By Byron J. Richards, CCN
November 12, 2006
NewsWithViews.com

Last week Americans sent a warning shot into the oversized belly of the Republican Party. Unfortunately for President Bush, Americans turned out not to be the zombies he was counting on. This week Bush is trying to figure out why his public health goons forgot to double the fluoride content in the drinking water prior to the elections. Even Hitler knew this was the best way to make a population docile.

25 November 2005

International Committee setting out to determine vitamin safety and health claims at risk of using flawed science according to experts

Today sees the end of three days of meetings of delegations from some 70 countries and numerous non-governmental organizations, at the 27th Session of the Codex Committee on Nutrition & Foods for Special Dietary Uses (CCNFSDU) in Bonn, Germany.

The Committee, which started developing a global guideline on vitamin-and-mineral food supplements more than 10 years ago, was attempting at this year‚s meeting to address a number of additional contentious issues.  Amongst others, these included the amounts of vitamins and minerals required for good health, the application of risk assessment to establish safe maximum dosages, the scientific basis of health claims, and the implementation of the World Health Organization‚s Global Strategy on Diet, Physical Activity and Health.

Press release MayDay - Civil Health Rights Movement, Denmark
By: Tamara Theresa Mosegaard
October 3, 2005

The Danish physician and health consultant, Carsten Vagn-Hansen, better known in Denmark as 'the radio doctor', received a fine of 10,000 DKr. last year for publicly writing about the health effects of dietary supplements, on the internet. He refused to pay the fine and instead took The Food Administration to Court. He won the case in September of this year.

Around 100 public listeners were in the Court room on Friday September 16 2005, to support the popular health speaker, whom - naturally - won the case. The opponent, The Food Region under the Food Administration, had the right to appeal the Court's decision until September 30, but this opportunity was not taken, so the case is therefore settled, and concludes that the Danish citizens may speak publicly about the health benefits of dietary supplements.

The supplement legislation of the Danish Food Administration have since autumn 2004 dictated, that if a dietary supplement has a beneficial, preventive, or therapeutic effect, then it must be registered as a pharmaceutical product. The restrictive legislation of the Food Administration is adopting the coming Pharmaceutical Directive of the European Union, in ahead of time.

October 28 - 30, 2005
Minneapolis, Minnesota

NHFC's National Conference for Health Freedom Advocates and
World Health Freedom Assembly

National Health Freedom Action

Keynote Speakers:

Dr. Carolyn Dean, MD., ND.
President of Friends of Freedom International
Doctor, Educator, Radio Host
Author of Death by Modern Medicine
"And They Became Silent"

Daniel Haley
Former New York State Assemblyman
Author of Politics in Healing
"Crimes Against Truth"

Diane Miller, JD
Director of Legal and Public Policy
National Health Freedom Coalition
"Leaders Becoming Leaders, Teams Becoming Teams"

Presentations by National and International Leaders

Jim Turner
Citizens for Health
"DSHEA Dietary Supplement Act of 1994,
Challenges and Successes, and Taking DSHEA Globally"

David Hinde and Robert Verkerk
Alliance for Natural Health
"The Judicial Opinion on the Challenge to the EU Food Supplement Directive"

Scott Tips
National Health Federation
"Impacting Global Bodies on Behalf of Health Freedom as a Delegate for an Organization with NGO Status at CODEX"

James Gormley
Nutrition 21
"Challenges to the Supplement Industry In Light of International Guidelines and Trade Agreements"

Trueman Tuck
Friends of Freedom International
"Global Strategies for Health Freedom - The Beehive Model of Friends of Freedom"

Suzanne Harris JD
The Law Loft
"Global Law and Politics and Strategies for the Health Freedom Movement"

Tim Bolen
Jurimed
"Effective Proceedings Against Quackbusters"

Clinton Miller
Sunshine Health Freedom Fund
"Mandated Mental Health Testing, Greenhouse Gases, and the Freedom to be Healthy"

Workshops for State Legislation

-- Freedom is Happening! Progress on State Laws -- How to Pass Health Freedom Laws In Your State -- Building Teams and Alliances That Bring Success

New Documentary Film on CODEX
"We Become Silent"
by Kevin Miller

World Health Freedom Assembly

On Sunday, delegates from each Health Freedom organization across the country and around the world gather in the Round to share their mission, their accomplishments, and their statements of solidarity

For Conference Brochure and Online Registration
go to www.nationalhealthfreedom.org

For more information, call 651 688 6515
or email jerrijohn@aol.com,
or call 952 476 8617
or email nhfc@willcox.us

Diane M. Miller JD
Legal and Public Policy Director
National Health Freedom Action
PMB 218
2136 Ford Parkway
St. Paul, MN 55116-1863
http://www.nationalhealthfreedom.org
Phone: 651-690-0732

4 July 2005 - The Codex Alimentarius Commission has adopted potentially restrictive guidelines for vitamin and mineral supplements as proposed by its Nutrition Committee last November in Bonn, Germany. In its 28th session here in sun dried, heat plagued Rome, the planet's supreme food regulator has given a nod to industry in approving guidelines for food supplements over the strenuous opposition of consumer representatives present under the banner of the National Health Federation.

Although the guidelines are not in themselves restricting supplement sales, they do prohibit information about diseases and nutrition and they call for future dosage restrictions to be set after scientific evaluation of the safety of nutrients contained in pills and capsules. Consumer representatives from different countries who attended the meeting are concerned that the guidelines, in conjunction with the European Union's directive on food supplements, may be a first step towards heavy controls on nutrition that would favor the pharmaceutical approach to disease over active, consumer-driven prevention.

Flaws and unclear points that should have sent the guideline back to the Nutrition Committee for reconsideration were pointed out by Scott Tips of the National Health Federation. Industry representative David Pineda of IADSA, the International Food/Dietary Supplements Alliance instead said that after more than 10 years of discussion in the Committee, the consensus that was reached is positive and should be adopted.

After short discussion of previously submitted comments by Australia, Brazil, China and Venezuela, the vitamin and mineral supplements guideline was passed - one item on a lengthy list of standards and guidelines to be adopted.

"What now?" was the largely unasked question of those concerned health freedom advocates who attended the meeting, one of whom answered: "We may have lost a battle, but the war is far from over". Indeed, much now depends on the discussions recently initiated by FAO and WHO, to work out a proper model to assess the risks inherent in supplements. "But rather than only assessing the risks, they must look at both benefits from these nutrients and risks, before they can reach a proper decision" said another one of the activists, and it appears that agreement is building that risk assessment procedures developed for toxic chemicals cannot be applied to nutrients without making a dog's breakfast.

So where do we go from here? We simply change gears to make sure that the benefits of supplements are not overlooked when deciding whether to limit quantities or composition.

I just watched a documentary, produced by Kevin Miller, that takes up the subject of international health legislation, as promoted by the European Union, Codex Alimentarius, the FDA and other, lesser players. "We become silent" is the first comprehensive effort to bring together testimony and information about an ongoing battle for health freedom.

Under the pretext of "protecting consumers", international rules are being put into effect, first in Europe but soon in other parts of the world, to tightly regulate healthy foods. The upshot is: kiss your vitamins good bye. And not only vitamins are due to be legislated out of existence. These new rules passed in secrecy will make it impossible to say NO to pharma-dominated medicine because one by one, the natural alternatives will all have been eliminated.

See the only known footage from inside a Codex Alimentarius meeting. Find out how, starting from Germany, the health madness spread all over Europe and is soon to engulf the rest of the world. And see what US legislators have to say about the mechanism of enforcement by which these new rules are going to be made binding, even on the mighty US. If you don't know Codex Alimentarius like the back of your hand or if anyone has told you that Codex is "nothing to worry about", like snopes.com recently did, you should see this film.

If you use supplements or natural medicine in any form, you should see the film to find out what's coming your way - and please ... SPREAD THE WORD.

See the Video here: "We become silent"

Google News
Published originally at EtherZone.com
By: Alan Stang

http://www.etherzone.com/2005/stang030405.shtml

Recently we wrote about the 72-year-old Florida grandmother whom the Food and Drug Administration Nazis are charging with a couple of felonies and some misdemeanors for helping cancer victims get the laetrile (Vitamin B-17) they need. There is still time for you to help her. Please let me know.

Now here come these same offspring of unmarried female canines, with a scheme that may outlaw dietary supplements as soon as June of this year. Yes, we are talking about vitamins, minerals and herbs.

Starting in June, dietary supplements in this country will be defined and controlled by the World Trade Organization (WTO) and the World Health Organization (WHO). The scheme is called the Codex Alimentarius (food code) and it mandates supplement standards for all member countries.

Codex nailed down “Step 8 (the final stage),” in a secret meeting in November, 2004, and if you are hearing about it for the first time, you are no doubt wondering how such an outrage could happen.

Consumers around Europe have a new chance to "Save Our Supplements" thanks to a new political initiative in the European Parliament launched by CHC, the leading pan-EU consumer pressure group.

Although we all hope that the current Legal Challenge put forward by ANH, HFMA and NAHS will succeed, we must accept that it may not. If we wait for the outcome, we will have lost valuable time. That is why CHC continues to try other options to keep supplements available.

The Food Supplements Directive (FSD) has already been passed and threatens to ban from July this year over 250 nutrients and nutrient sources that are key to the effectiveness of specialist vitamin and mineral supplements. It also proposes to ban in subsequent years all supplements above certain potencies that have yet be to specified. The ban is expected to wipe out all higher potency products other than a few available on prescription by medical practitioners.

But now there is hope that this can be averted!

Members of the European Parliament (MEPs), led by John Bowis MEP, have put down a new amendment to legislation being considered by the Environment Committee of the European Parliament. The amendment is technically being proposed to a new Regulation on nutrition and health claims made on food. The amendment would allow Member States to permit onto their own domestic markets products that are food supplements even if they would be banned by the separate Food Supplements Directive, so long as they are safe and only approved claims are made about their effects.

by: Jon Rappoport http://nomorefakenews.com

JANUARY 14, 2004. A new report from a prestigious government-connnected medical institute is calling for tighter regulation of nutritional supplements.

This report is timed to coincide with the final Codex push to place heavy restrictions on what supplements can be traded across national borders.

I'm told that the FDA is working with and watching Codex with great interest, as a possible prelude to trying to lower the boom on supplements sold within the US.

Reading the AP article below, you'll see that several key issues are being folded into the new report and the consequent follow-up from "medical experts": nutritional manufacturers need to step up their quality control procedures (what's actually in the capsule and how much of it is in there---this is a legitimate concern for consumers---although the US regulatory system that could govern this area will go about it in the wrong way); the inherent safety of supplements needs to be investigated in full (this is mostly nonsense because the overwhelming number of supplements are much, much safer than any drugs and have caused very, very, very few, if any, deaths around the world over the last few centuries); the efficacy of supplements in maintaining or restoring health must be tested in the same way that drugs are tested (this is complete crap---efficacy should not be the purview of the government at all, and the cost of studies that could be mandated will drive most supplement companies into bankruptcy); and health claims made by supplement manufacturers should be governed and controlled by the FDA (although some manufacturers make ridiculous health claims, we should err on the side of allowing such claims, since the supplements are inherently safe, and the consumer should be the judge of these claims).

By Colin Brown, Deputy Political Editor
03 January 2005

Ministers were accused of hypocrisy yesterday over an EU directive which could force health shops to stop selling a number of remedies and food supplements used by cancer sufferers and obese people.

The row is over attempts by the EU to ban food supplements and vitamin-based products which could be harmful in large doses, and for which the makers have made exaggerated health claims. But campaigners including Carole Caplin, the self-styled health and lifestyle guru, and the actress Jenny Seagrove say hundreds of remedies will be included in the ban.

Ms Caplin told MPs at a protest meeting that the directive will ban the sale of supplements containing calcium, magnesium and boron used for strengthening brittle bones and by patients with hip replacements; nutrient supplements and antioxidants for cancer sufferers; food supplements to reduce obesity; and folic acid supplements for women to reduce neural tube defects such as spina bifida in babies.

Durbin, Clinton, Waxman, Dingle Need to Read The Washington Post, Says Project: FANS; Vitamin D Article Illustrates How Vitamins, Nutritional Supplement

Mon May 24,12:55 PM ET
Sorce: NPIcenter.com

To: National Desk, Health Reporter

Contact: Joe Giganti, 703-928-9695, for Project: FANS, Joe@VeritasMediaGroup.com Web: http://www.ProjectFANS.org

WASHINGTON, May 24 /U.S. Newswire/ -- Project: FANS -- a grassroots organization formed to protect American's access to vitamins and nutritional supplements-is pleased by a recent front-page story in The Washington Post (5/21/04) that clearly illustrates the vital role that nutritional supplements can and do play in the improved health of America's children and adults alike.

Campaigner challenges Euro vitamin ban

By Times reporter
Source: Twickenham Times

A CONSERVATIVE politician in Richmond is campaigning to save a range of vitamins and mineral tablets from being banned by Europe.

Codex Guidelines for Vitamins and Minerals - Optional or Mandatory?

By Paul Anthony Taylor

Introduction

The Codex Alimentarius Guidelines for Vitamin and Mineral Supplements are a joint attempt by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the World Health Organization (WHO) to formulate one single standard governing the sale of food supplements that can be applied throughout the global market. Under the guise of free trade ‘harmonization’ the Guidelines are being drawn up by the Codex Committee on Nutrition and Foods for Special Dietary Uses (CCNFSDU), where vitamins and minerals are defined as foods. This committee meets in Germany once every year, usually in November.

Codex Alimentarius
Source: May Day

    Codex Alimentarius is established by The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and The World Health Organization (WHO) as an instrument for international cooperation in the field of Food and Agriculture.

   After applying for observer status several times MayDay was invited  by the Danish Ministry of Food and Agriculture in the spring of 2000 to participate as an observer at the Codex Committee on Nutrition and Foods for Special Dietary Uses meetings every year in Germany.

Vitamin Safety, RDAs and the Assault on Vitamin Freedom
by James South, M.A.
(Original here)

Once again, the right of Americans to purchase high potency nutritional supplements is under attack. The enemies of supplement freedom, such as U.S. Senators Richard Durbin (D-Ill.) and Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.), and Representatives John Dingell (D-Mich.) and Henry Waxman (D-Calif.), are pushing bills in Congress (SB 722 and HR 3377) that would empower the FDA to ban almost any supplement, as well as force costly pre-marketing approval and post-marketing surveillance on the vitamin industry that would radically increase supplement prices.1

Indeed, the proposed regulations would be more restrictive than those governing the prescription and over-the-counter drug industries! Underlying this assault on vitamin freedom is the (erroneous) belief that nutritional supplements are extremely dangerous, and that only nutrients with an officially defined DRI (dietary reference intake), at levels no more than 150 percent of the DRI, should be allowed to be sold.

BONN - November 3-7, 2003; The Codex Committee on Nutrition and Foods for special dietary uses met in Germany for its once-yearly come-together. On the agenda for discussion were, before baby foods and the description of healthy properties of food on labels, the proposed Codex Giudelines for "Vitamin and Mineral Food Supplements". Such guidelines would be, once passed, the equivalent of international law to be followed in all commerce of vitamin and mineral supplements.

As reported on 6 November, a very interesting proposal made by South Africa was, to officially acknowledge the importance of supplements to the prevention of degenerative diseases. This proposal was unceremoniously squashed by the German Chairman of the Committee Rolf Grossklaus and the "Observer" at Codex for the EU Commission, Basil Mathioudakis.

We now have an excellent report by Paul Taylor, who attended the discussions. Reading Paul's report, you will find out who are the people in control of the discussion that is supposed to be shaping laws we may have to follow in the future if we wish to continue to take nutritional supplements: One of them is Rolf Grossklaus, Chairman of the Committee, who often decided in a seemingly arbitrary fashion, what constituted a Committee "consensus" and what didn't. The other major player is Basil Mathioudakis, the EU "Observer", representing a solid block of nations whose officials attend the meetings but have practically lost any possibility of independent action.

You will also find out that for these two officials, nutrition and prevention "do not go together" and that prevention "is the province of medicine". Let us stop and think for a moment: International legislation, which will deeply affect our health choices, not to speak of the laws and health expenditures of a multitude of countries, is being formed by an obscure Committee of government bueraucrats, which in turn appears to be controlled or "steered" by a very small number of individuals who think that health and nutrition are complete strangers!

Considering the view that "nutrition has nothing to do with preventing illness", is it any wonder that health expenditures in most countries are on the rise, while health of the population seems to be at an all-time low?

Another in-depth report on the meeting has been prepared by Suzan Walter, President of the American Holistic Health Association. Suzan is very knowledgeable about the applicability of Codex Standards and Guidelines to international trade and, by extension, to national legislation on the subject of health and nutritional products. Suzan's report can be found on this page.

Dr. Ang Peng Wong from Malaysia has contributed his impressions of the Codex meeting and the discussions there. Coming from South East Asia, Dr. Wong brings us the viewpoint of the developing nations, and their specific concerns with western global trade dominance as expressed through Codex. His colorful description and his impressions can be found at the very end of this article, after Paul Taylor's report.