FTC and FDA Act Against Internet Vendors of “Fraudulent” Diabetes Cures and Treatments
![FTC AND FDA ACT AGAINST INTERNET VENDORS OF \](http://www.wholehealthcenters.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2008/07/fake-diabetes-site-lg.jpg "FTC AND FDA ACT AGAINST INTERNET VENDORS OF \")
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), working with government agencies in Mexico and Canada, have launched a drive to stop “deceptive Internet advertisements and sales of products misrepresented as cures or treatments for diabetes.”
The ongoing campaign has so far included approximately 180 warning letters and other advisories sent to online outlets in the three countries from the FDA’s Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition. The letters sent to marketers and makers of products for which cures are claimed are warned they have 15 days to remove all such claims. Failure to do so can lead to seizures of product, prosecutions and fines. The letter offers no advice, help or encouragement for testing the product.
“We will continue working with our partners in the U.S. and internationally to make sure scammers have no place to hide,” said Lydia Parnes, Director of the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection.
FTC has also launched a campaign to teach consumers how to avoid phony diabetes cures. The materials encourage consumers to “Be smart, be skeptical!” and will be available in English, Spanish, and French. One component is a “teaser” Web site available at http://wemarket4u.net/glucobate/index.html. At first glance, the site appears to be advertising a cure for diabetes called Glucobate, but when consumers click for more information on ordering the product, it reveals information about avoiding ads for phony cure-alls in the future.
The FDA/FTC uses the terms “scammers”, “deceptive advertisements”, “misrepresented as cures” and “fraudulent cures and treatments” to describe any claims to alleviate any physical or mental conditions or illnesses for substances or procedures of any kind that have not been through the approvals process of the FDA.
Claims that a substance can cure anything automatically classifies that substance as a drug, according to the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act, and drugs must be approved by the FDA. Unfortunately, there are very few FDA-approved drugs that claim cures, since cures are not popular with the big pharmaceutical companies that can afford the elaborate scientific testing needed for approvals.
It’s good that we have a government working to protect us from potential dangers. But in a more perfect world, the government would also have well-financed systems in place that would help facilitate testing all reasonable avenues and ideas for cures for disease.
Instead, our government’s health agencies appear to be in league with rich and powerful pharmaceutical companies whose stock in trade is maintaining disease, not producing cures and health. There’s no future profit in healthy people.