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Here's a great piece written by David Greenwalt of the Power Store:
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12/30/2003
Chinese Point Finger and Laugh at Stupid Americans
DIXON, IL-After 5000 years of safe use today the announcement was made that the
sale of ephedra-
containing products would be effectively outlawed in the United States.
"I can't imagine how stupid the Americans must be," said Chinese
Herbal Safety Committee
spokesperson Zhou Li Quing. "We've had this stuff for like 5000 years. The
Americans get it for a
few decades and screw it all up. Morons."
------------------
Okay, on with the real story.
The federal government announced on Tuesday a ban on the sale of ephedra, an
herbal supplement
used for weight control that, according to has been linked to a number of deaths
and harmful
side effects.
Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson said that "based on the
best possible scientific
evidence" his agency would issue a consumer alert about the dangers of
ephedra and will send notices
to manufacturers to stop selling the herbs.
"The time to stop taking this product is now," he said.
"They are just too risky to use," said the secretary.
David's comments:
5000 years. 5000 friggin years. Been used to treat everything from asthma to
allergies to colds.
5000 years. And all of a sudden, of all the OTC medicines and herbals out there,
ephedra-containing
products are hazardous.
Here's why ephedra is going to be outlawed in case you don't want to read any
further--mass hysteria
and class-action lawsuits.
The FDA initially started the ball rolling years ago. The media took hold of the
first few "claimed"
ephedra deaths and, as they are so good at, never let it go from there. 99.5% of
Americans couldn't
even spell ephedra, let alone it's Chinese name of Ma Huang just a few years
ago. But in this short
time ephedra went from being a safe and effective brochodilator to KILLER OF
ALL!
In the past couple years salivating, entrepreneurial attorneys grabbed hold of
what they could and
made enough of a civil case to get some cash for their clients. And this, ladies
and gentlemen, was
the REAL beginning of the end for ephedra.
The FDA had failed miserably to get ephedra banned earlier. Why? Because their
evidence sucked and
they were called on the carpet and literally "sent to their room without
supper" and "scolded" by a
another governmental committe empowered to oversee their research and
"hazards" discovered. So,
since they couldn't ban it on their own they found another way -- they created a
public awareness
unprecedented in their history in publicly CALLING for people to report adverse
events should they
ever experience them. My God folks. Wake up if you don't understand human
behavior here.
If I had the ear of 2-3 million Americans and put out a call to report adverse
events when they ate
hard-boiled eggs do you know what kind of mass calling in to report we'd get? It
would be huge!
People would blame EVERYTHING that ever occurred negatively in a given day on
hard-boiled eggs--
guaranteed.
So, the FDA, backed quite wonderfully by the over-sensationalized media, SAYS
that this supplement
has been reaking havoc on people's lives so if you would be so kind as to report
any events you have
if you are a user it would be appreciated. Oh, and here's the toll-free number
of Medwatch just so
you don't have to use your own money.
I remember in the initial witch hunt of ephedra that Ripped Fuel got blamed for
a death. Man was
killed in auto accident. Bridge girder went through the windshield and into his
head. Killed
instantly. Guess what. Ripped Fuel in the cab of the truck. Guess what got
blamed.
How about the shot-gun blast to the chest. Cause of death? Well, there was some
ephedrine in
the blood.
I'm not saying some people didn't die from its use. And any death by this manner
is sad. But that
isn't the standard in America. If 10 million doses are consumed each week and
3-4 people die a year
one has to consider everything before going on a witch hunt like the FDA and
media did thereafter.
Don't we? If not, then what about this ...
***************
Some OTC pain relievers can increase the risk for stomach bleeding by as much as
2-3 times and
account for more than 16,500 deaths and 103,000 hospitalizations in the U.S.
each year.
****************
Acetaminophen-containing products (Tylenol, Midol, Alka-Seltzer Plus, Vanquish,
etc.) result in over
100,000 calls a year to poison control centers, 560,000 visits to emergency
facilities, 260,000
hospitalizations, and 450 deaths. From 1996 to 1998 the average annual deaths
directly attributed to
acetaminophen averaged approximately
13. I wonder what the regulatory agencies would do if a supplement were to kill
450 people a year?
*****************
In another article we find this.
NEW YORK - Thursday, an advisory panel to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration
recommended that a
sterner warning should be put on acetaminophen, the painkiller sold by Johnson
& Johnson as Tylenol.
It's about time: Forbes wrote more than three years ago that the warning label
on the drug should be
made tougher.
The problem is this: When taken as directed, acetaminophen is safe. But the drug
is included not
only in Tylenol but in many over-the-counter cough and cold remedies. When a
patient winds up taking
more than the directed dose, liver damage or even death can result. If the FDA
takes its panel's
recommendation, the word acetaminophen would now be displayed more prominently
on drug packaging and
warnings about liver damage would be more strongly worded.
An FDA analysis indicated that 100 deaths and as many as 13,000 emergency room
visits result each
year from unintentional acetaminophen doses.
http://www.forbes.com/2002/09/20/0920tylenol.html
****************
Always remember this folks. Ephedra is gone but it's NOT because it is
inherently dangerous. It's
because of mass hysteria, misinformation, and class-action lawsuits. What a
joke.
Finally let me add this. I was at the American College of Sports Medicine
conference in Indy a few
years back when I heard the head of the dept. of nutrition at Harvard rock a
room with about 800
people in it by flat out saying that the mass hysteria and misinformation over
eggs was total B.S.
Remember when eggs were evil? That was just a few years ago folks. But who made
them evil? The media
and the parrots that make up much of the nutrition industry. "Well so and
so said it so I'll just
repeat it." That's how a lot of this stuff goes folks. Anyway, the Harvard
nutrition head got the
balls to say what was real and started showing the studies and asked the room of
educated leaders in
the fitness community how in the hell the information was allowed to get so out
of whack.
And this is what it takes to make a change for the better. Since it was the head
of nutrition at
Harvard who got the gonads to tell it like it is guess what happened? The media
grabbed it. They
listened! Then guess what happened. It APPEARED that the RESEARCH turned on its
head and NOW SAID
that eggs were okay. That was crap. The RESEARCH never waivered. It was there
all along. The media
had grabbed hold of some crap report God knows when and NEVER LET GO OF IT
always chanting the "eggs
are evil" mantra. So, it became America's reality. Now, the head of
nutrition at Harvard is making a
stand so guess we'll have to change gears. So, we just spin it that the RESEARCH
IS CONFLICTING and
NOW SAYS THAT EGGS ARE OKAY. Wrong! Eggs were ALWAYS okay and the research was
clear.
Like Dr. Phil says. There is no reality. Only your perception of reality. And
the media creates a
lot of reality for millions.
So, if you've made it this far let me give you the recipe to get a 5000-year old
herbal compound off
the American market:
- FDA conducts legitimate research into compound after few reported deaths.
- FDA gets their feathers in a ruffle when Dietary, Supplement, Health and
Education Act (DSHEA) is
passed in 1994. Sucks thumb and blubbers that they don't have any authority any
more to pull
DANGEROUS stuff off store shelves. Wrong. They've always had the power IF the
evidence indicated a
product was harmful. Keyword? Evidence.
- Supplement industry rebuttal is strong with scientific evidence indicating
ephedra is as safe as
other OTC supplements and meds.
- FDA continues
- Supplement industry begins to rally and begs of FDA to please look at the
friggin research.
- FDA continues, puts out call for public to PLEASE PLEASE PLEAASSSSSSSSSSSE
report adverse events
to Medwatch.
- Media really likes this banter between FDA and supplement industry. Also likes
death. Reports all
sides--the FDA's bogus cries of "no longer having power" and
"deaths" and "FDA's call for adverse
events" and, oh, yah, more deaths or maybe just a repeating of deaths
already told. Whatever, as
long as it's death it's good. Am I lying? Read your paper every day folks.
- Supplement industry continues to take it seriously but after careful review of
literature just
CANNOT find legitimate indication ephedra is excessively harmful. "No
worries mate!" Wrong
- FDA releases report that ephedra is a stone-cold killer. They are scolded by a
review committee
for their lack of evidence.
- Attorneys hungry for action sue big $$ companies that sold ephedra.
- Supplement industry knows they have a good product but starts getting nervous.
- FDA continues witch hunt. Watches and learns. "We don't have to regulate
it. If enough class-
action lawsuits occur it'll go away anyway. We win! We win!"
- Big companies start paying through the nose in lawsuits. Others get scared
(like me) and quit
selling it. Others follow. Nearly all companies quit making it.
- After the sale of ephedra is flaccid with no rebound in sight a national,
governmental call to ban
it is made. There will be no fight from the supplement industry. Look how good
our government is
at protecting us! Again, listen, there will be no fight from the supplement
industry. Sales are
dead through lawsuits. We no longer care other than being sickened by the
imbalance of it all.
Anyway, in case anyone forgets, someone can save this email so you know what it
takes in case you
want to get a supplement banned. FDA+Public Call for Adverse Events+Class-Action
Law Suits = death
of product.
Last but not least. About five years ago I wrote a friendly guide to the safe
use of ephedra. It's
still on The Power Store's website in the articles section. Check it out if you
want to see more
good info on claimed, adverse events and deaths. It's worth a read. Just use the
pull down menu in
the upper right and choose ARTICLES.
See ya Ephedra - man I really had some good workouts with Ultimate Orange,
Dymetadrine 25, E.P.H.
833, The Stack and others. Anyone remember those products? And to think too that
in the research a
stack of ephedrine and caffeine worked better than prescription drugs for weight
loss. But that's
just research published in peer-reviewed journals. What do they know?
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or have ideas on how to get it legalized in the USA once again, please visit the ephedra
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