The FDA has drafted a proposal to regulate what it calls New Dietary Ingredients. If this proposal is implemented, some of the most effective nutrients you take will be pulled from the market.
If passed, this New Dietary Ingredient guideline can define ALMOST ANYTHING as a “new” dietary ingredient. For example:
If a supplement includes more of an ingredient than was used 17 years ago–even if it is the same ingredient–it’s” new”.
If an ingredient uses a different extraction process–it’s” new”.
If a supplement uses an ingredient at a different “life state” such as using ripe rather than non-ripe apples–it’s “new”.
If a supplement duplicates an ingredient in a laboratory rather than extracting it from food–even though it’s chemically identical–it’s “new”.
If a probiotic formula includes a strain of bacteria that wasn’t found in yogurt 17 years ago, it’s “new”.
So what would happen to all these “new” ingredient? The manufacturers would have to take them off the market until they could PROVE the ingredients are safe–even if those ingredients have been safely used for 17 years!
From the time I was a very young child up to young adulthood, I spent each summer living with my grandparents, working on their farm in Kimberly, Idaho. The farm had milk cows, chickens, pigs, cats, dogs, and of course my horse and my sister’s horse. We children were a source of “free labor” and labor we did. Hoeing long rows of beans, beets, thinning beets, bailing hay, harvesting grain, not to mention milking cows each morning beginning at 4:00 A.M. and again each evening, and heaven forbid– the dreaded chickens and rooster who took particular delight in making my life “miserable” as they pecked my legs and hands as I gathered their eggs.
I was visiting with a doctor friend who will be gone the entire month of August for some extensive, intensive training in his field. He was lamenting the fact that he would be without any cell phone and computer service, nor have access to any electricity for the entire month due to the remote location of where he would be. Cell phones have become a standard necessity for most individuals. I see them attached to belts, inside pant pockets, inside suit pockets, inside purses, and in back packs. You can’t go into any public building without seeing people busy texting, talking, or dialing. In short, we are a nation that is “plugged” in. In a way, I think we have lost the art of social etiquette and have created a feeling of isolation for many people who stay electronically busy but are starved for real human companionship.
It’s a well-established fact that clean, pure water is a foundational cornerstone of good health. What’s open for discussion, however, is what constitutes “clean, pure water.”
