Lawmakers seek more oversight of dietary supplement market

Hearings and legislation are launched as concerns rise about dangerous products and unsubstantiated claims.

By Joel B. Finkelstein, AMNews staff. Nov. 17, 2003.

Washington -- Sales of spurious herbal remedies and dietary supplements have prompted congressional scrutiny and calls for extra regulation or enforcement.

In testimony before the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee, critics of the supplement market cited rising numbers of adverse events in arguing that government regulation has failed. These products fall under the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act, passed in 1994.

Under DSHEA, herbal remedies and botanicals are considered dietary supplements and are classified along with vitamins and minerals as foods rather than as drugs.

"There are an increasing number of reports that the quality, safety and/or efficacy of some herbal remedies is unacceptable," according to an American Medical Association statement. "Consumers cannot be sure that what is written on the product label is what is in the package. Also, there have been documented reports of impurities and adulterants in some herbal products."

Such products as ephedra-containing weight-loss pills and anabolic steroid-based performance enhancers have drawn attention to what many experts view as the law's shortcomings.

DSHEA originally was intended to make popular folk remedies more readily available to consumers, who at the time were clamoring for better access. But it may have gone too far, experts said.

"There are hundreds or thousands of dietary supplements with ridiculous claims being made for them," said Adriane Fugh-Berman, MD, associate professor in Georgetown University Medical Center's Dept. of Physiology. "There are safe and effective herbal medications that are out there, but they are in a sea of trash."