Citizens for Health Files Its Comments on CAM Guidance - Send Yours Today!

Official Comment Period Ends, Pressure on the FDA Heats Up

WASHINGTON, June 1st, 2007 - Citizens for Health (CFH) has filed its comments on the FDA's "Guidance for Industry on Complementary and Alternative Medicine Products and Their Regulation by the Food and Drug Administration", a document stating the agency's interpretation of existing policy governing supplements, alternative practioners, and non-traditional modalities. CFH representatives later hand-delivered those comments to the FDA's offices. (To read our comments to the FDA, see the attachment at the end of this article).

The "official" (see below) comment period that ended on May 29th saw thousands upon thousands of worried consumers and many advocacy organizations file their own comments, voicing their concerns about what implications this Guidance will have for our future access to supplements, nutrients, and the practioners and modalities we choose.

For proposed documents like the Guidance, the FDA provides a comments page specifically linked to the docket number for the document. May 29th was the last day to register comments in this manner as part of the official comment period, but you can still make yourself heard on the issue.

The FDA will accept comments on any subject in which they're involved or for which they're responsbile through their general comments email. CFH has created a special letter folks can use as a foundation for their own comments, or feel free to use as is. We have set it up so that once folks have finalized the letter and clicked on the button to send it, it will be automatically delivered to the FDA's Dockets Division and to their point person on the Guidance, Philip Chao.

More than 200,000 comments have already been sent to the FDA on the CAM Guidance, and they are overwhelmingly negative and concerned. We at CFH believe the Guidance creates more questions than it resolves regarding the FDA's purview and authority with respect to the natural health industry and basic health freedoms, and are urging the FDA to withdraw the Guidance altogether.

However, it's not enough for us or other health freedom organizations to speak up; we are but a small portion of the 150 million people in this country who use supplements and non-traditional forms of health care every day. On the other hand, that 150 million represents one of the most potentially potent forces for change in this country, and if even a tenth of that number were mobilized to protect our access to the practitoners and health care approaches we choose, we couldn't lose.

So, please pass this information along to all you know, and encourage them to visit www.citizens.org and make their voices heard. Don't forget to review CFH's comments on the Guidance in the attachment at the end of this article, and feel free to paraphrase anything you wish to support your own comments.