Natural Health Products Directorate
The Natural Health Products Directorate (NHPD) is the division of the Health Products and Food Branch of Health Canada that is responsible for implementation of the Natural Health Product Regulations, including Good Manufacturing Practices, for Natural Health Products for sale in Canada. Marilyn Nelson, former President of Freedom for Choice in Health Care, and now Co-Executive Director of National Health Federation Canada, fought vigorously in favor of keeping our supplements as foods under the banner, “Foods Are Not Drugs.” Thanks to Health Canada, our supplements, vitamins, minerals, herbs, homeopathic medicines, and probiotics are now drugs – drugs that require a Natural Health Product Number. As part of the Health Products and Food Branch of Health Canada, the Natural Health Products Directorate (NHPD) is the regulating authority for natural health products for sale in Canada.
Through years of intimidation, abuse, harassment, threats and gun-drawn raids, natural-health companies have struggled to stay in business, cowing to the irrational whims and dictates of Health Canada. Many have gone under, unable to pay astronomical lawyer fees to mount a proper defense. To further weaken the industry’s position, in 1997, the Canadian Health Food Association (CHFA), was hijacked after 30 years in Vancouver and moved to Toronto. The new President was a man with no experience in the industry. He did, however, have a background in public relations and a father who was a pharmacist. The writing was on the wall. Then, the next CHFA President worked for a company that had been bought by a German pharmaceutical company. To pull off such a takeover takes money, strategy, time, and the abuse of power. To add further insult to injury, these same people have created their own flourishing natural-health and consulting businesses. Follow the money!
Not only is Health Canada ignoring the fact that to date there are no known significantly effective natural weight loss aids, they’re clearly doing an awful job of ensuring that the products that they are allowing to steal Canadians’ hard earned money and well-intentioned hope aren’t in fact injected with prescription medications.
We are in this mess because powerful drug cartels benefit from sick people, not healthy people. There is a war on for your health; and if the pharmaceutical industry and our co-opted government have their way, you are the loser. What stands between them and the unhealthy consumer is the natural-health industry. Naturally, it has been the target for elimination for decades. A mixture of willingness to comply and naivety has kept the industry on its knees for this time period. With the ramping up of the final takedown of the industry underway, through bills like C-36 and trade agreements like CETA, we are all on the threshold of tolerance.
Anyone out there want to take a bet that not only will it take longer than an additional year but that the criteria they establish will be woefully underpowered and still won’t sweep the many miracles in a bottle that prey on defenseless Canadians off store shelves?
