Codex Alimentarius To Approve 'Vitamin Guidelines'
The Codex Alimentarius Commission (CAC) will be meeing here in Rome for a week-long conclave from 4 to 9 July, and one of the agenda points is the final approval of new world-wide vitamin guidelines that are expected to restrict availability of nutrient-containing supplements to consumers the world over. The text of the guidelines was finalized last November in Germany, by the Codex Committee on Nutrition and Foods for Special Dietary Uses. I will be reporting from the CAC meeting, attending as part of a delegation of the National Health Federation, one of the very few voices that argue the side of consumer freedom of choice inside the meetings, albeit without a vote.
These types of international regulation are elaborated without public input and even without the consent of national parliaments of the participating countries.
Each country entrusts its vote, which will eventually determine national laws as well, to one person, the head of the national Codex delegation. And Codex delegations are typically headed by relatively low level administrative employees of national health ministries. So we are having what amounts to international laws being developed over the heads of and without input from national legislative authorities, let alone the public that will face the consequences. Democratic procedure has been officially abolished in the name of globalizing the economy and "removing barriers to trade".
As reported in Food Navigator: New Codex guidelines on vitamins, minerals no longer guaranteed  20/06/2005 - "A handful of countries are threatening the adoption next month of new world standards on how to set maximum levels of vitamins and minerals, reports Dominique Patton."
My comment: It appears that the supplement industry associations, especially IADSA, see the Codex process as a game with only two alternative outcomes: Either RDA dosages for supplements or safety-based dosages. Of course they prefer the safety base. No consideration seems to have been given to the fact that safety of vitamins and minerals, if assessed by standards that have been developed for toxic substances, is going to be little better than RDA dosages. Perhaps the German "safety evaluation" of vitamins and minerals should be a grim reminder of what can happen if safety is over-zealously protected...Investigative journalist Peter Byrne introduces his article The Fate of Vitamins with the following words:
A low-profile organization created by the United Nations is about to ban global trade of many essential nutrients - and there may be nothing you can do to stop it.- - -
Peter Byrne, according to his own site, has an uncanny ability to mine reportable nuggets of graft and corruption out of mountains of government and corporate records — not to mention human sources. He knows how to get inside the soul of self-serving systems — be they created by left-wingers, neocons, or non-ideologically-inspired criminals — and find the facts.
At first I was a bit skeptical about that characterization, but after reading the article, I tend to agree.
Byrne takes us behind the smoke-screens into a world of corporate globalization. International agencies which closely co-operate with big pharma and big food are well on the way to carving up a potentially lucrative health and foods market and turning it over to its "rightful owners", the big global players. While not catching all of the technical details of this complex matter, the insights and the "big picture" he paints are worth reading even for those who think they have a pretty good understanding of what is going on. Here is his article:
- - -
The Fate of VitaminsA low-profile organization created by the United Nations is about to ban global trade of many essential nutrients—and there may be nothing you can do to stop it
By Peter Byrne
If you use vitamin and mineral supplements for health, you might want to fly over to Rome, Italy and crash the July 4-9 meeting of the Codex Alimentarius Commission, a little-known international body that wields immense power over the global food market. Should the Codex Commission approve the Draft Guidelines for Vitamin and Mineral Supplements on its agenda, 300 of the 420 basic vitamin and mineral products commonly used by European consumers will be banned from manufacture and trade inside the European Community.
The ban will seriously impact the export business of U.S.-based supplement companies and could eventually result in similar product restrictions being implemented here. The Codex story has received almost no attention in the corporate press and media; although badly garbled versions of the tale zing about in cyberspace, confusing many readers with conspiracy-laden mixtures of fact and fantasy. Which is not to blame the authors of these emails, since the Codex Alimentarius (Latin for "food code") Commission is so pathologically bureaucratic that its real intentions, and the probable consequences of its actions, are difficult to discern when wading through thousands of pages of jargon in its public reports. For example, it is not true that over-the-counter vitamins and minerals will be banned in the United States after August 2005...
Read the rest of the article on the NHF site
Other related articles:News with Views: KISS YOUR VITAMINS GOODBYE!
By Dr. Carolyn Dean - June 19, 2005The Vitamin Police Are Suiting Up
by Gary North (on www.lewrockwell.ocm)http://www.healthfreedomusa.org
WorldNetDaily
Your dietary supplements: Under attack againWhy organized medicine wants to outlaw nutrition and turn healers into criminals
How about some truth for a change about the Food Supplements Directive in the European Union? The proponents of this directive say that it's about protecting patients from all these dangerous vitamins, minerals, supplements, plant extracts and antioxidants that are so dangerous for people. They say, "We're going to keep you safe!"
Snopes.com says that this is all smoke and mirrors. The Codex Threat is an urban legend and we shouldn't worry about it. See the article by Barbara "vitaminimized" Mikkelson - Vitamin SeeDonna Cinelli takes Snopes to task for their sloppy evaluation of the facts. I found Donna's letter on the Alternative Medicine Forum.
Date: Sat, 11 Jun 2005 15:00:01 -0400
From: NeverSurrender@...
Subject: Snopes is saying CODEX is a hoax!
Dear Ms. Mikkelson:It was with a great degree of upset, anger, and frustration that I read your posting on Snopes regarding the CODEX issue as a hoax.
I sincerely hope that Snopes and you are simply misinformed and you will correct your flawed analysis of the CODEX issue. It is NOT. On the other hand, it could be that you are acting on behalf of certain interest groups, which I hope is not the case. The truth will come out depending on how you respond to this and other emails that if you are not getting now are surely coming soon.
I take issue with many points you argue, but most important is your claim that CODEX has no power to force its will on any nation. "Codex standards are voluntary, which means if the U.S. doesn't adopt them, they will not govern the regulation of vitamins, minerals, or dietary supplements in the USA." THIS IS NOT TRUE!!
The US signed the SPS and TBT Agreements, which are subsections of GATT. Codex standards and guidelines were voluntary up until the Uruguay Round of GATT, which created the WTO that has enforcement power via a new international court that doesn't follow our rules of evidence- the Dispute Settlement Body. The WTO has put the mechanisms in place to override any national law that interferes with multinational corporate profits, and that is why Congressman Ron Paul tried to remove us from the WTO in 2000 via House Joint Resolution 90.
Several WTO rulings have gone against US law, forcing Congress to change our law under threat of cross sector trade sanctions against broad sectors of our economy, the most recent and publicized of these was the situation regarding our steel industry and tariffs. If they can force the US to change policy over such a vital national interest as our steel industry, the dietary and herbal supplement industry will be easy.
Next is your claim that "this is another case of an issue that is now largely moot due to outdated information. Back in 2003, two versions of a bill that proposed the regulation of dietary supplements (S. 722, the "Dietary Supplement Safety Act of 2003," and H.R. 3377, the "Dietary Supplement Access and Awareness Act") were introduced to Congress. Neither of these bills was ever voted upon, much less passed. They both expired with the end of the 108th Congress in 2004 and have not been reintroduced to the currently sitting 109th Congress."
If you had bothered to do some research and verification of your information, you would have discovered that both Sen. Durbin's and Sen. Davis's offices have indicated that they fully intend to reintroduce both bills, with slight changes, under new bill numbers, sometime in this new congress. Both of these members of Congress are currently re-writing these bills with the full intention of reintroducing them under new numbers. When they are reintroduced, we will not be able to take either one lightly.
Next, you also state "Under current law, dangerous supplements get onto the market and stay there, with serious physical harm resulting among those who use them, as was the case with ephedra, which caused strokes, heart attacks, and upwards of 150 deaths before the Food and Drug Administration was finally able to get it out of the stores."
These statements are false and are not backed up by any solid evidence. Again, if you had taken the time to research and verify this statement you would have seen by referring to http://www.laleva.cc/supplements/medical_injury_law.pdf that the risk of ingesting prescription drugs, the risk of dying from a bee sting, the risk of being hit by lightening, the risk of dying from ingestion of food in common form, are all higher than any risk posed by use of vitamins and other dietary supplements. This is a GROSS misstatement and one that needs to be corrected.
You go on to talk about problems with tryptophan and ephedra. The problems with tryptophan were caused by the contamination of one producer in Japan, but instead of sanctioning that company until the problems were corrected, the FDA jumped on the issue with much misinformation and banned all tryptophan products, while also making an effort to demonize the entire supplement industry. Similarly, the ephedra issue was exaggerated to the point of being a total lie, because any honest examination of the data gathered by the National Association of Poison Control Centers will indicate that there are very serious problems associated with deaths caused by Ephedrine, but there have been very few and minor problems caused by ephedra. Meanwhile, the FDA allows dangerous drugs such as celebrex and vioxx on the market, which have proven deadly side effects for thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of people. There are no dangerous dietary supplements, only dangerous pharmaceutical drugs. These are just two examples of the "witch hunt mentality" that is already present in the FDA who acts more like a trade association for the pharmaceutical corporations because there is a revolving door between their employees and the drug companies. Public record will easily reveal that.
You also support your arguments by stating that supplement sales totaled $18.7 billion in 2002.
This is a trivial amount compared to pharmaceutical sales that totaled $430.3 billion in 2002. Whom do you think has the power and motivation to bring dietary supplements and vitamins into the realm of prescription drugs? Statistics regarding the rise in prices of supplements in countries that have adopted the CODEX "guidelines" show why the pharmaceutical companies are in favor of CODEX and why it's adoption would detrimentally impact the health of US citizens.
The drug company backed proposals call for the following:
1.) No vitamin, mineral, herb, etc., can be sold for prophylactic (preventative) or therapeutic reasons.2.) Natural remedies can be sold as food but they must not exceed the potency (dosage) levels set by the commission. This means that consumer access to dietary supplements will be limited to the RDA dosage as a maximum limit for vitamins (vitamin C - 60 mg, vitamin E - 15 mg, etc.). Supplements without an RDA (e.g. coenzyme Q10) would be illegal to sell because they would all become drugs.
3.) Codex regulations for dietary supplements would become binding, eliminating the escape clause within the General Agreement of Tariffs and Trade (GATT) that allows a nation to set its own standards. This applies to all member countries of the U.N. Any nation that does not accept and apply these new standards will be heavily fined by the World Trade Organization (WTO), creating the potential for crippling entire sectors of the nation's economy.
4.) All new supplements would be banned unless they went through the Codex approval process.
CODEX now applies to Norway and Germany, among others, where zinc tablets rose from $4 per bottle to $52. Echinacea (an ancient immune-enhancement herb) rose from $14 to $153 (both examples are now allowed by prescription only). They are now "drugs". Vitamin C above 200 mg, niacin above 32 mg, and vitamin B6 above 4 mg - all are banned over-the-counter and considered as drugs. No amino acids (arginine, lysine, carnitine, etc. (these are essential amino acids!), essential fatty acids (omegas 3, 6, 9, etc.), or other essential supplements such as DMEA, DHEA, CoQ10, MSM, beta-carotene, etc. are allowed.According to Dr. Matthias Rath, researcher and author who discovered a correlation between vitamin C deficiency and heart disease, the three drug companies pushing so hard for the German proposal - Hoechst, Bayer and BASF - are also manufacturers of heart drugs. Here you can clearly see the connection to drug company interests as there are many inexpensive natural products that promote health, which is at odds with their highly profitable companies which need diseases to "treat" with dangerous drugs. Obviously, with the health supplement and vitamin competition gone, nothing will stop their profits.
By the way, these are the three drug companies formed when the Nuremberg War Trials disbanded IG Farben, manufacturer of the poison gas used in Nazi concentration camps. Although IG Farben may have been disbanded, none of its directors were ever penalized for their actions during the war. They simply divided what remained from the company and split into three separate entities.
These three Nazi-originated German drug companies have stated their main purpose as being to "...create a set of international standards to guide the world's growing food industry and to protect the health of consumers." If you really believe that, I have a bridge to sell you in Brooklyn.
Snopes has just done the public a serious disservice with their misinformation, creating confusion, and misleading Americans.
Codex regulations for dietary supplements would become binding, eliminating the escape clause within the General Agreement of Tariffs and Trade (GATT) that allows a nation to set its own standards. This applies to all member countries of the U.N. Any nation that does not accept and apply these new standards will be heavily fined by the World Trade Organization (WTO), creating the potential for crippling entire sectors of the nation's economy.
We cannot protect our supplement laws in the USA unless we can kill ratification of the global trade standard for vitamins and minerals which stands to be ratified at the Codex meeting in Rome between July 4-9th 2005 or withdraw from the WTO.
My interest in this matter is not purely altruistic. I have personally experienced some "miraculous" cures through natural remedies and natural medicine, not the least of which was a complete remission of extremely debilitating endometriosis through the administration of homeopathic products. I continue to manage my everyday health and the health of my family with dietary supplements. I just recovered from what could have been a very debilitating influenza with the use of Echinacea, goldenseal, and germanium 132. I had very mild symptoms for 3 days as compared to others I know who had severe symptoms, contracted secondary infections, and had illnesses that lasted from 10 days to 2 weeks. I have animals that consistently far exceed their natural life spans by as much as 50% and live that life with the vigor and health of animals half their age. So you see my interest is very personal and I am very committed to stopping CODEX.
I would very much appreciate a response from you to this letter. I will gladly provide you with source material I used in this letter and any other additional credible source material you may need or request.
Sincerely,Donna Cinelli
- - -
Apparently, Snopes is "hard of hearing" on some issues. Certainly it is on Codex. Here is another letter (email I presume) recently sent to Snopes.com:
Re: http://www.snopes.com/politics/medical/vitamins.asp
About that nasty Codex Alimentarius issue that you all seem to think has gone away...
It hasn't. Your information is full of very large holes and in this case Snopes is misleading, much more so than the "rumour" it seeks to debunk.
Yes, the good doctor's statement also had errors in it. No, the European Union is not now under Codex guidelines; but those in effect currently in the EU are practically twins. Those Europeans don't believe in boiling the frog slowly, they're hardy folk and took it all in one big hit. So the EU guidelines, by mimicking the Codex guidelines in advance of Codex's 2009 (not 2005!) deadline for implementation, will make Codex feel like a minor bump instead of a catastrophe for natural health freedom. Meanwhile, a low-potency, low-dose, synthetic version of Vitamin D costs over $200 US in Germany, right now. Just wait till you see what Codex does over here...
I suggest you take a surf over to www.nocodexgenocide.com immediately to check your facts. Better yet, see if you can get past the documented evidence accumulated by the inimitable John Hammell, whose very life depends on these supplements. Make sure you do all the reading, follow all the links. Once you get sick and tired of wading through the proof of what Codex is, how it is being infiltrated into 171 nations and the EU all at once, how many products are being lost from the shelves (most of which, curiously, bear a strange resemblance to the restricted lists to come with Codex implementation), and how many lives and livelihoods are threatened by Codex Alimentarius, you will never again want to be wishy-washy about your own research.
You must realize that this is no small issue. Medical care is not the 4th leading cause of death in the USA... it is the LEADING cause of death, at nearly 800,000 Americans per year. The producers of the toxic pharmaceuticals that are killing people daily are the same people influencing the "food code": Codex Alimentarius. The Chair of Codex, Dr. Rolf Grossklaus, is in fact the CEO of the German risk-assessment corporation which designed, for Codex, the ridiculous dosage and potency limits on what our bodies consider FOOD. Beyond that, Codex has the temerity to ban organic farming, traditional medicines, and all energetic healing... including acupuncture!
Most of all, can you honestly say that this is the sort of health care you want for the rest of your lives, for your children's lives, for your granchildren? If you don't care, forget I wrote anything, and leave this so-called "rumor" lie like a sleeping dog. If you do, DO something about the mistakes you've made. The information is readily available (I gave you the best source on the net, nocodexgenocide.com). There ARE bills in front of the Senate and the House that ultimately affect health freedom via our sovereignty, if not directly. Not only that, they're doing it simultaneously in Canada, Mexico, and the USA through NAFTA and the agreements made while we weren't looking! They're slick, these pharmacrats...
Go find the truth, and it will make you sick. If you choose to be free, in this particular regard, sadly, you'll have to work a little harder than that.Unfortunately sincerely,
Dee Nicholson,
Campaign Coordinator,
Stop Codex Alliance (Canada)- - -
In contrast, see this article that actually cites sources...
The Growing Threats to DSHEA
A well documented article by Paul Taylor, discussing DSHEA, the US law on food supplements passed in 1994, and how this law may be influenced by the Codex Alimentarius guidelines on supplements...
posted by Sepp Hasslberger on Friday June 10 2005
updated on Sunday December 5 2010URL of this article:
http://www.newmediaexplorer.org/sepp/2005/06/10/codex_alimentarius_to_approve_vitamin_guidelines.htm
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December 04, 2003 - Sepp Hasslberger
