Industry criticizes NY AG challenge of botanical supplement ingredients
NEW YORK — New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman on Monday called on four major retailers — GNC, Target, Walmart and Walgreens — to stop selling store-brand herbal supplement products in New York that could not be verified to contain the labeled substance by using what the industry describes as a questionable testing method — DNA barcoding.
“These actions today by the New York State Attorney General’s office smack of a self-serving publicity stunt under the guise of protecting public health," stated Steve Mister, president and CEO of the Council for Responsible Nutrition. "Supposed concerns about the products in question are based on a novel testing method that has been roundly criticized by botanical scientists who question whether DNA barcoding technology is an appropriate or validated test for determining the presence of herbal ingredients in finished botanical products," he said. "Processing during manufacturing of botanical supplements can remove or damage DNA; therefore while a DNA testing method can be useful in some cases, this method well may be the wrong test for these kinds of products."
Responsible manufacturers and retailers take careful measures to ensure their consumers can purchase high-quality botanical supplements that contain what is on the label, Mister said. "We stand by the safety and regulation of these products. We urge the New York State Attorney General to subject its own questionable testing methods to the same public scrutiny and peer review that he has called upon for our products.”
Not only is the testing method itself suspect for these kinds of products, Mister added, but the scientist who developed the assay and conducted the testing is not a botanical or a food expert. "He is an evolutionary biologist who specializes in testing DNA in dinosaurs and lizards," Mister said.
According to the AG tests, overall, just 21% of the test results from store-brand herbal supplements verified DNA from the plants listed on the products’ labels — with 79% coming up empty for DNA related to the labeled content or verifying contamination with other plant material. “This investigation makes one thing abundantly clear: the old adage ‘buyer beware’ may be especially true for consumers of herbal supplements,” commented Schneiderman. "The DNA test results seem to confirm long-standing questions about the herbal supplement industry. Mislabeling, contamination, and false advertising are illegal. They also pose unacceptable risks to New York families — especially those with allergies to hidden ingredients. At the end of the day, American corporations must step up to the plate and ensure that their customers are getting what they pay for, especially when it involves promises of good health.”
But the DNA testing method does not provide information on the amounts of food contaminants found in the products, countered Mister. "This is important because there are well-established legal thresholds that allow for trace amounts of some ingredients like gluten, and trace amounts of DNA from rice, beans, pine, citrus, etc., are not considered harmful or required on labels. Announcing the detection of minute amounts of these substances unnecessarily alarms consumers without informing them whether the detection of DNA from these substances poses any allergic risk," he said.
"Instead of giving companies a reasonable opportunity to respond to these concerns, the [New York] AG unfortunately chose to label [the four retailers] guilty without a fair trial," Mister added. "Dietary supplement companies are required by law to adhere to Good Manufacturing Practices which include identity testing for all botanical materials used. Different identification test methods, from simple titration to chromatography and mass spectrometry, are appropriate for different stages of the processing — from the whole plant to the extract, to the finished product. Companies identify all incoming materials and keep records of these test results, and those test results could have been shared if companies had been approached in a reasonable manner with a reasonable timeframe," Mister said. "The FDA, which enforces these identity requirements through routine inspections, does not require DNA barcode testing; nor should it, given that this novel approach has not been validated for finished products."