Tag: Herbal Supplements
How Safe is CBD?
CBD is a drug, but sold as both a drug and herbal supplement. What does the current evidence say about its safety?
Pandemic drives huge surge in herbal remedy sales
The COVID-19 pandemic has fueled a boom in herbal supplement sales.
Oleandra – The New COVID Snake Oil
Oleandrin is being promoted as the new COVID-19 snake oil - but it is a deadly toxin.
Billions on herbal remedies – and for what?
Consumers spend billions each year on herbal remedies, with little to show for it.
Statins beat supplements
Red yeast rice supplements have poor quality control and there's no clear evidence they do anything beneficial. So why take it?
The Supplement Con
A new article in Business Insider challenges the major narrative promoted by the supplement industry - that supplements are safe, effective, natural, and actually in the bottle. If we are lucky, this may mark a the start of a sea change in how Americans see supplements.
Supplements, Lies, and a Lengthy Transcript
On October 21, 1993, there was a hearing before the U.S. Senate Committee for Labor and Human Resources, with the long-winded title: Examining How the Federal Government Should Regulate the Marketing and Use of Dietary Supplements and Related Measures, Including S. 784, To Strengthen Federal Standards with Respect To Dietary Supplements. S. 784, sponsored by Sen. Orrin Hatch, would eventually be enacted...
The consumer lab rat: More questions about supplement safety
Do you take a vitamin or dietary supplement? Over half of all American adults do, making this a $30 billion dollar business. Many of us even take supplements in the absence of any clear medical or health need. I’m often told it’s a form of nutritional “insurance” or it’s being taken for some presumed beneficial effect – like Steven Novella outlined in...
Is there a natural treatment for tinnitus?
“Why do you bother blogging?” asked a colleague. “You take hours of your personal time to write, and you do it for free. You’re not even getting any citations for all that work.” I admit I found the questions a bit surprising. True, you won’t find SBM posts abstracted in PubMed. But I’m writing for an entirely different audience. I blog for...
DMAA: Efficacious but is it Safe?
by Igor I. Bussel & Drey A. Pavlov Jann Bellamy has recently authored an excellent piece on the limitations of the FDA and how the DSHEA actually protects the profits of supplement manufacturers rather than the health and well-being of consumers. Bellamy used the very poignant and currently “controversial” example of DMAA (methylhexanamine or 1,3-dimethylamylamine) to illustrate her point regarding the loopholes...