JustCare

Tag: Food safety

  • If we can import food safely, why not medicines?

    If we can import food safely, why not medicines?

    Have you ever thought about the difference between importing food and importing medicines? They both require oversight to ensure safety. Curiously, the US Food and Drug Administration, FDA, which is charged with overseeing the safety of food and drugs, has no issue with ensuring the safety of imported foods but prohibits drug importation, allegedly because of safety concerns. Hint: That’s not the reason.

    The FDA could ensure the safety of imported medicines if it can ensure the safety of imported foods. As a new Tarbell investigative piece by Michael McAuliff shows, the principal reason that the FDA bans drug importation is because the pharmaceutical companies want it that way. (Note: Though drug importation is technically illegal, millions of Americans buy drugs abroad, and the US has never prosecuted anyone who bought drugs abroad for personal use.)

    McAuliff details how Pharma has been working with the FDA and Pharma-funded entities to try to make it hard for people to buy drugs online from abroad. And, through its agents, it has enlisted Visa and MasterCard to help; people sometimes cannot use these credit cards to buy drugs from abroad online. Payments to many of the verified pharmacies on Pharmacychecker.com, which verifies pharmacies as legitimate, are by check.

    To be clear, the evidence suggests that drugs purchased from verified pharmacies abroad are as safe as drugs purchased in the US. There is not one report to the contrary that anyone can point to.

    What the data show is that the lax standards for FDA approval of prescription drugs and medical devices in the US as well as for certain chemicals in foods and other products create serious patient safety issues that are not being adequately addressed. Yet, neither the FDA nor Congress is suggesting stricter standards for their approval.

    “Patient safety” should mean access to affordable medicines. Withholding people’s ability to purchase drugs from abroad can put them at far greater risk than making it as easy as possible for them to get the affordable medicines they need.

    ******Mother’s Day Gift: The Ten Should-Do’s for Your Health, Purse and Peace of Mind, Chapter One of Aging, Schmaging, by Diane Archer. For $5, you can help the people you love and support Just Care.

    Here’s more from Just Care:

  • New FDA rules let companies decide what food is safe

    New FDA rules let companies decide what food is safe

    The FDA just issued a new rule on foods “generally recognized as safe” or GRAS. And, according to the Center for Science in the Public Interest, the rule does not deliver on protecting people from unsafe chemicals.  It permits companies to decide which chemicals are safe in foods without being accountable for their decisions.

    The Center for Science in the Public Interest argues that decisions about what chemicals are safe in foods “should be transparent and unbiased.”  But, the new rule allows companies to market foods they deem safe without even letting the FDA know; the companies do not even need to list the chemical additives in processed foods as ingredients. The FDA also allows companies to hire their own scientists who are beholden to the companies to determine which foods are safe.

    So, the question remains, how safe is the processed food you eat? Read more from Just Care on food safety here.

    Here’s more from Just Care:

  • How safe is the food you eat?

    How safe is the food you eat?

    How safe is the food you eat? It’s hard to say. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is leaving it to industry to ensure the safety of the chemical additives in our food. So, processed foods and beverages may contain chemical additives that the FDA has not tested. It’s another reason to follow a Mediterranean diet, if you can and to stay away from processed foods to the extent possible.

    How is it that the FDA is not required to test the chemicals in our food? The Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act requires the FDA to create a system of pre-market review of chemicals added to foods and to reassess their safety periodically as new evidence emerges. But, the FDA can and has allowed the food and beverage industries to conduct their own review of the safety of chemicals in food. And, the FDA lets the industries’ experts determine whether the chemicals are generally recognized as safe, “GRAS.”

    Senator Edward Markey of Massachusetts is on a campaign to get the FDA to assess the safety of all chemicals in foods and beverages rather than delegate this role to the food and beverage industries. Right now, there are an estimated 1000 chemicals in our food supply that the FDA has not tested for safety, according to the Pew Charitable Trusts. The FDA does not even know which chemicals are being used, which foods contain them, and the amount of these chemicals in a particular product, because there are no disclosure requirements on industry.

    The food and beverage industry should not be able to self-determine their safety.  And, they should have to disclose these chemical ingredients in their products. Allowing industry to hire the “experts” who decide whether particular ingredients in their foods are safe poses a real conflict of interest.

    But, there appears to be a question about the scope of the FDA’s authority to assess the safety of these chemical ingredients, which is concerning. It’s not clear that the FDA has the authority to ensure the safety of GRAS ingredients, let alone the budget. It’s also not clear whether the FDA could require special labeling of foods with GRAS ingredients.

    Even when the FDA knows about ingredients with safety concerns, the industry can still include these ingredients in their foods. For example, the FDA found sweet lupin caused allergic reactions in people with peanut allergies. But, the company that notified the FDA about its use of sweet lupin pulled its notice to the FDA. An investigation into the use of sweet lupin found 20 foods containing it; their manufacturers were still allowed to deem the ingredient GRAS.

    At the very least, shouldn’t there be a label on all foods with GRAS ingredients letting the public know that the FDA has not approved these ingredients as safe?

    Here’s more from Just Care on good nutrition and food safety: