House Panel Hears Testimony on Ephedra

A hearing before a House panel considering regulations on dietary supplements including ephedra continues Thursday when lawmakers are scheduled to hear from officials of Major League Baseball, the National Football League, Major League Soccer and NASCAR, as well as the FDA and Federal Trade Commission.

Congress should rewrite a law that rolled back dietary-supplement regulations and require manufacturers to acknowledge potential side effects, Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson said Wednesday.

Thompson's comments came as the House Energy and Commerce oversight subcommittee opened two days of hearings on the supplements, with a particular focus on ephedra, often promoted as a weight-loss product. Ephedra has been linked to as many as 100 deaths.

Ernie and Pat Bechler, the parents of Baltimore Orioles pitcher Steve Bechler, were among those who testified. Their son died during spring training last February. He had been trying to lose weight, and toxicology tests after his death showed ephedra in his system.


ephedra

Unles he's a show-whorse.

An interesting article

http://www.theleftcoaster.com/archives/000054.html

And on the heels of that comes news that Mr. Righteous himself Orrin Hatch has been a protector and whore for the dietary supplements industry, an industry under the microscope more and more lately due to the growing concerns from consumers about deaths from these products and the lack of federal oversight of this industry. Hatch apparently not only whored himself to the industry and protected them from greater federal oversight (like Joe Lieberman did for the accounting industry), but watched in happiness as the industry directed a large amount of lobbying fees to firms that employed his son.

For more than a decade, the dietary supplements industry has counted on Sen. Orrin G. Hatch to fend off tighter regulation of products such as ephedra, the controversial stimulant linked to more than 80 deaths — most recently a young Baltimore Orioles baseball player.

Among other things, the Utah Republican co-wrote the 1994 law that lets supplement makers sell products without the scientific premarket safety testing required for drugs and other food additives. That law has proved a major obstacle to federal control of ephedra.

-continued-

Among other things, the Utah Republican co-wrote the 1994 law that lets supplement makers sell products without the scientific premarket safety testing required for drugs and other food additives. That law has proved a major obstacle to federal control of ephedra.


Can they go any lower? Selling drugs without testing them first?

:argh: