Herbal Medicine

[juliejjulie]

Is everyone aware that the government are about to ban the sale of herbal medicines without a prescription?
This means that you may not even be able to buy a tube of arnica cream or even nettle tea. Please take a look at www.pranapositive.com/shm/ for more information and sign the petition. Many thanks.

This is going to be a real interesting problem in the future if people don't start making a noise right now. If you make any use of herbal medicine whatsoever, you need to take action.

From the site linked to by juliejjulie:

In April 2011, European legislation which has already been PASSED will come into force which will effectively mean that ALL Herbal medicines will disappear from the UK. No Ayurvedic (Indian) herbs, no Chinese herbs, no Western herbs, no Tibetan herbs, NO MEDICINAL HERBS WHATSOEVER. You will only have access to treatments which are Pharmaceutical Drugs based in order to treat your own and your families ailments. No access to ANY MEDICINAL HERBS. With no access to the full range of Herbal treatments, Herbalists, Ayurvedic doctors, TCM Practitioners and other Herbal traditions will OVERNIGHT, disappear from UK as well.

Anyone have any ideas what more can be done?

The legislation will demand a level of scientific evidence for all substances marketed as a treatment.

This will only mean the removal of products which probably shouldn't be marketed anyway.

I'm glad this piece of legislation is being pushed forward.

No western herbs???? How the fuck am I going to make pesto?

It's EU political correctness GONE MAD!!!

I think this is fair enough. There was a huge amount of consultation on this some time ago; then would have been the time to protest.

www.mhra.gov.uk/home/groups/pl-p/documents/websiteresources/con2022465.pdf

Herbal supplements are not going to be banned, just regulated if you wish to sell these products for profit. Seventy products (including popular remedies such as echinecea, valerian, St Johns wort etc) have already been licensed. Plus, you are of course still free to grow your own.

?Herbal medicine?s been around for thousands of years! Indeed it has. And then we tested it all, and the stuff that worked became medicine. And the rest of it?s just a nice bowl of soup and some pot pourri.? - Dara O?Briain

Wikipedia (and factually correct):

"The Traditional Herbal Medicinal Products Directive, 2004/24/EC, was established to provide a regulatory approval process for herbal medicines in the European Union (EU), and came into force on 30 April 2004. Previously, there was no formal EU wide authorisation procedure, so each EU member stated regulated these types of products at the national level.

Under this regulation, all herbal medicinal products are required to obtain an authorisation to market within the EU. Those products marketed before this legislation came into force can continue to market their product until 30 April 2011, under the transitional measures defined in the Traditional Herbal Medicinal Products Directive. Once this time limit has expired, all herbal medicinal products must have prior authorisation before they can be marketed in the EU".

In other words, manufacturers of herbal products have had seven years to register their products, and if needed, gather the necessary evidence. If they have chosen not to, that is hardly the fault of the EU. All they are requesting that any product offered for sale has (1) demonstrable efficacy in the treatment of the stated conditions and (2) appropriate labelling regarding the safety of the product ie, no different to any other medicine, or foodstuff currently available, and in fact the level of evidence needed was/is far far less than a new pharmaceutical would need before being licenced for use.

I too think herbal medicines need to be regulated. Many have "interesting" effects and can be dangerous if used incorrectly.

Regulation is necessary. Ayurvedic medicine has been found to contain toxic amounts of heavy metals.

I speak to people regularly who say they are saving the NHS a fortune by using herbal remedies instead of drugs -- often, drugs with serious side effects. Mark my words, this measure will put up costs for everyone and profits for big pharma at a time when economy is increasingly necessary.

Using herbal medicine is not an option which is forced on anyone. If you think there is no need for it, don't use it. But why stop me using it?

@LittleCheesyPineappleOne: You can't grow Poria Cocos in the UK! A lot of the herbs I use aren't exactly for medical conditions but are for example general tonics. It would be hard to demonstrate their efficacy as in trialling a drug, and there's no need for the seller to make any claim about what the herb does. I just want the herb! I'm perfectly satisfied that the herbs I use work for what I want.

To me the document you quote shows a series of very briefly stated objections (some of them nonetheless good ones) and if that was the only consultation the whole thing seems to have been kept very quiet! First I've heard about it anyhow.

@WhatsWrongWithYou: I know the quote well. I happen to disagree with it, and think there's more going on with many herbal remedies than western medicine has yet discovered. I understand some think different, but can't work out why that should prevent me getting the herbs I'm after.

The government seems to think that the ordinary person can just pitch up and open a school for the big society but is not sensible enough to choose a herbal remedy. Or is it more to do with profit for the big pharmacutical companies and a little bit more power for the EU. I wonder...

I'm sure you will be perfectly able to buy nettle tea, but sellers of nettle tea will not be able to make spurious claims about its benefits.

@TrillianSlasher well we'll see the list when it's unveiled, but you can bet codonopsis will not be on it.

I don't care what claims are made in print on a box. I just want what's inside.

It's a good thing to regulate it

OK let me give you an example.

I spoke with someone just last weekend whose daughter has a condition for which she takes Chinese herbs that completely cure it. The alternative is a drug that would cost the NHS a lot of money -- £20,000 a year. She pays for those herbs herself.

And you want to talk about "interesting" side effects? Long term use of the drug in question has been linked with cancer and leukemia. But the drug is still on the market.

The typical attitude is, ok, let's test the herbs. The problem is that herbal remedies (and especially Chinese ones, which is why the TCM community wanted to be treated under a different system) don't work like drugs. Although these herbs cure the condition in this one person, they might not cure it in everyone. Herbal remedies don't only address symptoms directly and aren't given only for molecular lesions. Each mix is designed specifically for the case in hand. Thus you can't exactly test it the way you would test a drug.

I realize that not everyone cares about that; fine. You still have the right to use your preferred option. Please don't take away my right to use mine, or that girl's right to use hers.

Of course big pharma is behind it. What they dislike is the increasing numbers of people turning to this stuff and finding it does work for them. If somebody is coming up with 'these things are dangerous' arguments, I'd like to see some evidence of just how many people are experience bad side effects from herbs, compared to the number experiencing them from pharmaceuticals.

www4.dr-rath-foundation.org/PHARMACEUTICAL_BUSINESS/laws/law07.htm

It's not like the safety factors for herbs aren't known, and their toxicity. Every herbal carries warnings about dosage and research is always being done. The amount of adverse reactions experienced in pharmaceutical drugs is far greater.

I'm in favour of regulation. I am surprised this is the first you have heard of it. The legislative process has been going on for years!
Quacks have been peddling crap for a quick buck for far too long.
No one is going to stop anyone drinking peppermint tea.

@TurnipLantern I only just heard of it because I only just got into herbs that do me a lot of good.

But do you fancy addressing my points? Peppermint tea is a bit of an easy case. What about exotic herbs that don't address symptoms directly? What about the example I gave in my last post? You might think that girl got her herbs from 'quacks', but I assure you she doesn't.

Anecdotes don't make good law. I am sure there will be some 'deserving losers' from the change. There always are after any legislation. But in this case far more people will protected from exploitation and/or toxic substances. There are plenty of large corporations making a lot of money.

And, before you ask, I think the regulation of conventional medicine is inadequate too.

MN is very pro orthodox medicine, Prokopton. Just look at the cancer threads. There are tons of NHS employees on here, and some health journos. Those of us that use alternative medicine are accustomed to being flamed, so we don't bother to post much on the subject. However, I'll follow up your links.

the plural of anecdote is not data

Balanced view from The Herb Society, who couldn't be accused of representing "Big Pharma":
www.herbsociety.org.uk/legislation.htm

Additionally the MHRA have explicitly said they wish to be sensitive to the continuation of ayurvedic medicine and Traditional Chinese Medicine.

The pdf I linked to was a summary of the variety of people who were consulted back in 2004 (from individuals to organisations). It was hardly quiet; this has been huge news in both the orthodox and complementary medicine worlds for 7 years.

Stating "NO MEDICINAL HERBS WHATSOEVER" will be allowed is simply wrong; about 70 herbal supplements have already been approved, and many more are pending:
www.mhra.gov.uk/Publications/PublicAssessmentReports/PublicAssessmentReportsforherbalmedicines/index.htm

This isn't an isolated anecdote! Everyone who regularly buys anything that is going to be banned from sale has a stake in this, if it works for them.

On efficacity, the evidence is there for people to make up their own minds, including from their own experience. At a time when the NHS is severely stretched, you can't afford to take away whole swathes of a modality that people are relying on. If it is in any way preventable, I think it would be far wiser to keep people's options open. I have no monetary stake in this, but I am not going to be as healthy because of it, and I can assure you, at the miniscule prices I pay, I'm making no-one rich.

You didn't catch my point about the way herbs are often prescribed. If there's no way to test them like conventional drugs, how on earth can they be licensed, even if they pass a toxicity test? They can't. They can't be forced into the straitjacket of conventional medicine.

Toxicity: where are the examples of serious difficulties with toxicity from use of the time-tested herbs? Do you have figures on that? Anything equivalent to the increased risk of cancer from Remicade say? (A drug costing £5,000/course of treatment.) As I say, toxicities have been noted in herbs and everyone who uses them takes account of them. They're not secret. Can you show me examples of people's bad reactions to herbs being an immense problem? A couple of things have been noted recently such as comfrey although that research is highly debatable in itself. Where are you getting this idea that masses of people are being poisoned?

*Approximately 8% of all hospital admissions in the U.S. are due to adverse reactions to synthetic drugs. That's a minimum of 2,000,000. At least 100,000 people a year die from them. That's just in the U.S., and that's a conservative estimate. That means at least three times as many people are killed in the U.S. by pharmaceutical drugs as are killed by drunken drivers.

Can you show me anything equivalent in the realm of herbal medicine?

See this page for good info on toxicity (and the nature of herbal action too), if you really want to understand the arguments:

www.henriettesherbal.com/faqs/medi-5-1-side-effects.html

"You didn't catch my point about the way herbs are often prescribed. If there's no way to test them like conventional drugs, how on earth can they be licensed, even if they pass a toxicity test? They can't. They can't be forced into the straitjacket of conventional medicine."

This is such a cop-out. Why is herbal medicine or alternative medicine exempt from rigorous scientific enquiry? All this argument does is make the person making it look like a quack.

Prokopton said

"Thus you can't exactly test it the way you would test a drug."

Yes, you can.

It would be very easy to do a double blind randomly controlled on this type of intervention.

After the practitioner has done whatever they want to individualise the treatment, half of them get an inert substitute.

Pretty straight forward and when you do this kind of test some herbal remedies can demonstrate effectiveness.
Most can't.

Exactly @DBenett - you do a blinded crossover trial, or an RCT.

@FrenchBulldog: Thanks. That makes sense. I won't go on too long then. :)

@yesyouknowme: I'm not attempting to make a data-based case about effectiveness by using an anecdote. I'm making a point about civil liberties and simple economics.

@LittleCheesyPineappleOne -- but the 'balanced view' looks very much against doesn't it? Can you point me to that MHRA statement please about ayurveda and TCM please?

The page you linked is supplements only -- how about leaf herbs?