CAFTA & CODEX want to expand health fascism
From Ron Paul's latest LRC column:
CAFTA is bad enough without the CODEX tie-in, but this makes it much worse. For one thing, this represents a further blow to the true right that individuals have in regards to health care, the right to self-treatment. Rather than respecting the right of individuals to make their own decisions in regards to health maintenance and seek out their own preferred course of treatment, politicians and bureaucrats wish to wield even more control over your health, and thus, your life.
What's worse is that there are many people who are currently outside of the current medical monopoly due to being unemployed, employed without benefits, or simply choosing to avoid the system. Many of these people seek nutritional supplements in order to maintain their health so that trips to the doctor become less frequent, or they wish to turn to alternative methods of treatment that don't require a trip to the local medical monopolist (aka doctor), sucking up both valuable time and money, in order to get a permission slip (aka prescription) to get a certain, rationed amount of whatever treatment is desired or needed. Enforcement of CODEX regulations would wind up forcing people to deal with that bullshit not just for pharmaceutical drugs like Oxycontin, but for vitamins and supplements too!
All of this amounts to increased cartelization of the health industry as the medical monopoly (also a cartel) increases it's costly and toxic effects over our lives by seeking an even greater outlet to satisfy it's insatiable appetite for power. The medical monopolists love it because it signals a future full of increased profits as people are forced to seek their attention even more. The pharmaceutical companies love it since one of the their biggest competitors would be doomed, which'll mean more profits for the likes of Pfizer. Bureaucrats love it since they're a bunch of parasites and they'll be able to suck even more wealth and life energy out of us.
The ultimate losers are, once again, everyday people like you and me. As Ron Paul mentioned at the end of his column, this aspect of CAFTA alone makes it a bill that should be opposed. Not only is it anti-liberty, but it's also anti-health.
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Technorati Tags: CAFTA, CODEX
The House of Representatives is scheduled to vote on the Central American Free Trade Agreement in the next two weeks, and one little-known provision of the agreement desperately needs to be exposed to public view. CAFTA, like the World Trade Organization, may serve as a forum for restricting or even banning dietary supplements in the U.S.
The Codex Alimentarius Commission, organized by the United Nations in the 1960s, is charged with “harmonizing” food and supplement rules between all nations of the world. Under Codex rules, even basic vitamins and minerals require a doctor’s prescription. The European Union already has adopted Codex-type regulations, regulations that will be in effect across Europe later this year. This raises concerns that the Europeans will challenge our relatively open market for health supplements in a WTO forum. This is hardly far-fetched, as Congress already has cravenly changed our tax laws to comply with a WTO order.
Like WTO, CAFTA increases the possibility that Codex regulations will be imposed on the American public. Section 6 of CAFTA discusses Codex as a regulatory standard for nations that join the agreement. If CAFTA has nothing to do with dietary supplements, as CAFTA supporters claim, why in the world does it specifically mention Codex?
Unquestionably there has been a slow but sustained effort to regulate dietary supplements on an international level. WTO and CAFTA are part of this effort. Passage of CAFTA does not mean your supplements will be outlawed immediately, but it will mean that another international trade body will have a say over whether American supplement regulations meet international standards. And make no mistake about it, those international standards are moving steadily toward the Codex regime and its draconian restrictions on health freedom. So the question is this: Does CAFTA, with its link to Codex, make it more likely or less likely that someday you will need a doctor’s prescription to buy even simple supplements like Vitamin C? The answer is clear. CAFTA means less freedom for you, and more control for bureaucrats who do not answer to American voters.
CAFTA is bad enough without the CODEX tie-in, but this makes it much worse. For one thing, this represents a further blow to the true right that individuals have in regards to health care, the right to self-treatment. Rather than respecting the right of individuals to make their own decisions in regards to health maintenance and seek out their own preferred course of treatment, politicians and bureaucrats wish to wield even more control over your health, and thus, your life.
What's worse is that there are many people who are currently outside of the current medical monopoly due to being unemployed, employed without benefits, or simply choosing to avoid the system. Many of these people seek nutritional supplements in order to maintain their health so that trips to the doctor become less frequent, or they wish to turn to alternative methods of treatment that don't require a trip to the local medical monopolist (aka doctor), sucking up both valuable time and money, in order to get a permission slip (aka prescription) to get a certain, rationed amount of whatever treatment is desired or needed. Enforcement of CODEX regulations would wind up forcing people to deal with that bullshit not just for pharmaceutical drugs like Oxycontin, but for vitamins and supplements too!
All of this amounts to increased cartelization of the health industry as the medical monopoly (also a cartel) increases it's costly and toxic effects over our lives by seeking an even greater outlet to satisfy it's insatiable appetite for power. The medical monopolists love it because it signals a future full of increased profits as people are forced to seek their attention even more. The pharmaceutical companies love it since one of the their biggest competitors would be doomed, which'll mean more profits for the likes of Pfizer. Bureaucrats love it since they're a bunch of parasites and they'll be able to suck even more wealth and life energy out of us.
The ultimate losers are, once again, everyday people like you and me. As Ron Paul mentioned at the end of his column, this aspect of CAFTA alone makes it a bill that should be opposed. Not only is it anti-liberty, but it's also anti-health.
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Technorati Tags: CAFTA, CODEX
posted by freeman at 7/19/2005 02:40:00 PM
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