FWIW, the FDA isn’t banning homeopathic OTC’s. But what they are proposing will be to “more carefully scrutinize these products, especially those sold to treat infants and children, those containing ingredients with significant safety concerns, such as belladonna, and those sold for serious conditions such as opioid addiction, heart disease and cancer.”
“During a briefing for reporters about the proposed new policy, FDA officials stressed that the agency had no intention of requiring most homeopathic products that are on the market to undergo formal FDA review, however, or to remove most homeopathic products. So people who believe such products help them will still have access to many of them, the officials said.”
I.e. if a homeopathic OTC has something like belladonna (deadly nightshade) in it and or is marketed to children such as the teething tablets that killed 10 babies and injured at least 400, if I understand correctly, that type of product will have to meet manufacturing and labeling standards as would a true pharmaceutical, as it should.
What people don’t understand is that since 1988, the homeopathic medicinal industry has gone completely unregulated. The teething pills that contain a miniscule amount of belladonna in one batch was found to have contain dangerous levels in the next. Or even contain ingredients not on the label. One has to be careful in the regard with herbal supplements. In addition, a homeopathic medicinal can make claims to treat or even cure serious medical conditions with absolutely no proof that it does, leading some to believe their condition is being treated and forgoing actual treatment.
So this will not affect those of you taking things like turmeric or herbal remedies or even most homeopathic medicinals.
FWIW, I think homeopathy is quackery in that if it is truly homeopathic, the so called active ingredient, the one that supposedly causes symptoms similar to that of the disease or condition it is “treating” is diluted to the point of often not containing a single molecule of the “active” ingredient or so small as to be negligible, but homeopaths claim the water retains a “memory” of some sort. But since homeopathic concoctions aren’t regulated at all, they can also contain ingredients not so diluted such as the belladonna in the teething tablets.
I do not believe this for a minute, because for decades now, the FDA, and now joined by the FTC, has wanted to explosively increase its power by regulating ALL products that may be consumed for health purposes.
I noticed in their statement they were using a bureaucratic trick, “that because .0001% is bad, we must regulate 100%.”
What makes matters worse is that the FDA is despised as being corrupt and in the pocket of big pharma, incompetent, using objectively bad science, and worst of all totally ignores dangerous public health threats that it should be taking care of.
Sadly, their efforts to grab more power have generally been thwarted by just one senator, Orrin Hatch.
But let me put this in real terms.
I have three doctors: a competent GP, a Rheumatologist MD, and a Rheumatologist DO. I also have a less common form of arthritis.
There are over 100 different kinds of arthritis, and over 200 different kinds of rheumatism. In different people they are responsive to a different litany of treatments unique to them. These treatments include some very harsh and dangerous pharma, any number of analgesics, lots and lots of OTC products, and even things like dietary changes and fruit juices.
As far as the GP is concerned, since she has a limited toolkit of pharma, about all she could recommend were analgesics and a referral to a rheumatologist. She cannot detect the disease with blood, urine or stool samples, or external examination. Nor could she treat it with other than pharma, no other means.
The rheumatologist MD is somewhat more flexible, but like other MDs is handicapped by his reliance on pharma. Granted he is using top notch, cutting edge pharma, it is still just a fraction of what is available.
I much prefer the rheumatologist DO. Whereas before I was distrustful of DOs, associating them with chiropractors and the like, this one is willing to experiment and is very pragmatic. His toolkit is much larger, and he will keep trying until he finds the best combination for a given patient.
For the FDA and FTC to slash and burn his toolkit, because what is in there is neither approved by their version of science, nor profitable to the pharma industry, would be tragic and quite literally crippling to a vast number of people suffering from complicated diseases like this.
Yes, we do need an FDA. But they need a major reformation.
What they do not need is a grand expansion of their authority and power, at least until they have been reformed.