July 14, 2010

IOM Wants Supplements Treated Like Drugs

The Institute of Medicine (IOM) is petitioning Congress to give the FDA increased authority over health claims on supplements. In their opinion, supplements and drugs should be treated the same when it comes to health claims.

Currently, the FDA uses different standards to evaluate health claims of supplements and drugs. Drugs are evaluated as an entire product, where supplements are evaluated on a per ingredient basis. According to the IOM, this has led to a reckless number of unsubstantiated health claims for supplements.

In a recent report the IOM claims that there is no good scientific reason to use different standards for health claims between supplements and drugs since they both share the goal of improving human health. Therefore, they suggest that a new system should be devised that allows both to use biomarkers as a substitute for clinical outcomes.

Experts in the field believe the IOM is only trying to attack the ability of supplement manufacturers to inform the public about their product‘s health benefits. Regulatory expert Vincent Annunziata of Nutritional Supplement Compliance Solutions, LLC says, "The current process gives the FDA significant authority. Harmonizing the standards will not offer any additional benefits. Could the IOM be addressing the issue of structure-function claims?"

Indeed, the more science proves the health benefit of supplements, the more interest there seems to be in silencing supplement companies. After all, if it was common knowledge that supplements could benefit public health, people would pursue these preventative measures instead of pharmaceutical drugs.