I have a feeling that a lot of these supplements are doing more harm than good. I really wish the FDA would step in and regulate the vitamin market the same way they do with normal medicine like Tylenol, etc.
However, if you are going to regulate based on real evidence of harm, then you would do the same for fast foods. There we have substantially more evidence of harm than we currently have with supplements.
Or we could decide to live in a free country and stop criminalizing what people decide to put into their bodies of their own free will. We are trending to free access to marijuana, I would find it ironic to then start restricting supplements.
The FDA has wanted to do something about this for a long time. They clearly see supplements as dangerous (especially things like 6000% RDA).
1. You can't advertise any benefit without having a clinical trial (funded by the company) showing that benefit.
2. A strict (every 6 months) inspection of manufacturing facilities.
3. You're required to list the ingredients, and the inspections make sure you're using them.
4. All known side effects are required (found during aforementioned clinical trials) to be listed.
By contrast, the FDA is specifically prohibited from applying these regulations to the supplement industry. Unsurprisingly, many studies have found that the companies involved don't even bother to put the active ingredients in the pills.
I’d even consider it for Foods heavy in certain vitamins. Pineapples have a mega load of vitamin c. Put those behind the counter as well. Why let people risk their health.
Neither you nor the government should be telling me what I can put in my body.
> Why let people risk their health.
Because it's their health to risk, not yours.