Health In Motion

The Spirit and Letter of Bills C-51 & C-52 are not about protecting Canadians from poor quality health products, but rather the destruction of the natural health industry in Canada. It moves natural health products, medical devices, cells, tissues, organs and drugs under the heading “therapeutic products”. It does not differentiate between drugs and natural health products. At this point the bill does not impact the Natural Health Product Regulations.

It defines a practitioner in such a manner that NDs will be denied access to natural health products deemed prescription therapeutic products. It also includes definitions of “sell” and “controlled activity” that differ from provincial legislation.

It also proposes sweeping new powers of enforcement with increased penalties including the ability to enter business establishments without a warrant. Now Health Canada will be able to break the existing laws of the country and operate outside of the court system. This bill will also give them the power to seize bank accounts without a court order, trampling on the Constitution and the Charter.

There is fear that the federal government wants to outlaw up to 60 per cent of natural health products currently sold in Canada. And despite claims to the contrary, in a short while, Health Canada will start recalling any products deemed having health and safety concerns. The concern is that this enforcement will be arbitrary and alarmist, and not necessarily based on a real risk of harm to the public, but merely on “suspicion of harm.” Who will be the arbiter of this suspicion, and what medical qualifications will they possess, for example in the highly complex medicine of TCM?

Prescriptions may not be needed at the moment, but with increasingly (perhaps unjustified) standards of evidence being foisted upon NHPs in the future, there is a potential for limited product availability. Inspectors will have increased powers to enforce regulations and achieve compliance.

Without this legislation being reworded and amended, a mother giving an herb to her child, could get arrested for engaging in the sale of unregulated, unapproved therapeutic substances. And yet, the fundamental weakness of C-51 is that it fails in requirements for transparency in pharmaceutical regulation. The pharmaceutical industry itself has a long and shameful history of hiding from the public studies that suggest drugs are not beneficial, and studies showing they are dangerous.

I think it’s obvious that we need to be more concerned about unsafe pharmaceuticals, rather than NHP’s, based on track records. Pharmaceuticals are known to cause untold deaths annually. Reverse the situation and insert the words “natural health products” into the above sentence. Now imagine the holier than thou shouting from orthodox circles. Insert sanctimonious and indignant remarks (here) and (here).

There is little doubt, that pharmaceutical companies are lobbying heavily for this bill. They see the huge growth and ballooning market in the natural food and health supplements, and would just love to get their hands on it, bringing it under tight regulations so these products could only be sold like drugs.

That brings me to the point of Tony Clement, who may have a conflict of interest. For example, he owned (and may still own) 25% of a Toronto-based chemical pharmaceutical company between the time he stopped being the Ontario Minister of Health and Long-Term Care (in 2003) and became the federal Minister of Health (in 2006).

So in the tradition of the Communist Party, Tony Clement and his goose stepping friends at Health Canada are trying to stick us with bills glaringly biased towards pharmaceutical companies. We should expect – indeed, we should demand – more of our government.