Herbal Supplements Are Often Not What They Seem - Carsin Ablon, 1st Period.

Using a high-tech DNA scanning and bar-code examination test, Canadian researchers uncovered that several popular herbal supplements used to fight colds, reduce hot flashes, and boost your memory, are frauds. Upon further detailed examinations, the Canadian researchers found that several supplements were made of nothing more than ground rice, soy, wheat, and other cheap fillers and can contain little to none of the listed, effective ingredients as listed on the bottle's label. Some popular Herbal supplements such as Parthenium, a cold preventing pill, contains good amounts of a bitter, invasive, ground up weed found in Australia as well as India that has been linked to rashes and nausea. Another popular supplement labeled St. John's Wort, when tested, contained nothing but ground rice while others contained nothing but an Egyptian shrub that acts as a laxative. These fake pills brought the thoroughness of medical inspection to attention as some other faux pills contain ground nuts which can be hazardous for allergic consumers. David Schardt, a nutritionist at the Center for Science in the Public Interest, angrily said “This suggests that the problems are widespread and that quality control for many companies, whether through ignorance, incompetence or dishonesty, is unacceptable" leading to him stating that they will no longer recommend any herbal supplements until the fake pills are recalled and the companies are inspected. Upon further examination, the Canadian researchers discovered that the broken herbal supplement inspection system allows companies to put out products with false labels until somebody points out that the product is a fraud created to contribute to the huge five billion dollar supplement market.  

I find that this article is a prime example of the cheap materialistic ways of large corporations with in-genuine intentions of creating a large economy biased on a false marketing and mischievous strategies. With large medicine companies packing capsules  and compacting pills with un-needed weeds and shrubs, many peoples trust and loyalty to the companies should vanish.  Not only are these bottles of useless pills frauds with the potential to harm allergic consumers, but they are overpriced as ground rice, wheat, soy etc are some of the cheapest natural fillers available. Although laws exist that protect the sales by claiming that the consumer is responsible for their purchases and how they are used, putting out overpriced, fake pills seems like it should cross the line. Many corporations have felt the whiplash of this recent realization however the medical inspection sects, in my opinion, have not received enough of a punishment as they seem to continue passing terrible product.

To read more or watch a video, see: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/05/science/herbal-supplements-are-often-not-what-they-seem.html?ref=science&_r=1&