Archive for Wednesday 3rd July 2002 - The EU

The EU is hazardous to your health. It’s official, according to campaigners who are fighting the Euro-ban on over 300 products now on health food store shelves.

Worse is to follow, all herbal remedies which have not been on sale for at least 30 years will be illegal when another Euro-directive becomes law. Sue Croft, director of Consumers for Health Choice, explained: “The bottom line is that consumers are going to lose thousands of health-giving products for nothing better than political expediency.

“Anybody who is trying to kid us that this is a measure of safety is being very economical with the truth.”

The proposed laws would require, say, a traditional garlic remedy to undergo the same level of testing as a possible cancer drug.

Support for the campaign against these regulations is coming from many health-conscious celebrities, including Paul McCartney, Cliff Richard, Elton John and Jools Holland.

These draconian regulations are an attempt to standardise products across Europe, where, for instance, the British and Dutch take their supplements much more seriously than the French and the Germans.

Millions of us will lose part of our freedom to take responsibility for our own health and well being, when products such as Vitamin C, multivitamins and folic acid are pronounced unsafe. The result? Further strain on the already over-stretched health service.

Another bitter irony is that when health food supplements are tested under this new regime animals will be the victims – over-stuffed with vitamins to establish what dangerous doses might be.

And it will be the small, specialised health stops which will suffer, as the high street giants such as Boots have already welcomed the proposals. Although the first of the directives is now passed, it has to be implemented by UK health ministers and they can use their discretionary powers to moderate its effect.

You can make your views known by writing to health minister Lord Hunt at the Department of Health, 79 Whitehall, London SW1A 2NS. For more information, visit: www.healthchoice.org.uk

Mark Winter

~ MARK WINTER ARCHIVES ~