A seemingly simple supplement registry could quietly reshape the entire natural health market—and limit what consumers can access. Action Alert!

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THE TOPLINE

• The proposed Dietary Supplement Listing Act is framed as a transparency measure, but it would effectively create a premarket approval system.
• The compliance burden would likely hit small and innovative supplement companies hardest, leading to market consolidation and fewer niche or practitioner-grade products for consumers.
• A centralized FDA registry could become a tool to target and remove certain supplements, while doing little to stop illegal or adulterated products that already evade existing laws.

Imagine walking into your local health store—or opening your usual online shop—and finding that a supplement you’ve relied on for years is suddenly gone. No warning, no clear explanation. It’s just gone.

For millions of Americans who use vitamins, minerals, and other supplements as part of their daily health routines, this could be the reality if Congress enacts the latest version of Dietary Supplement Listing Act, the bill long championed by Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL), but this time introduced by Representative Maxine Dexter, MD (D-OR).

On its face, the Dietary Supplement Listing Act sounds like a simple transparency measure. Who could oppose a basic product registry? But the reality is, as we’ve argued for years, this bill is the first step towards eliminating supplements you care about.

The Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act—the law governing how supplements are regulated in the US—was designed to treat supplements as a category of food, not drugs, with regulators stepping in when problems arise. This bill flips that logic, creating a de facto premarket approval system akin to how drugs are treated.

The burden won’t fall evenly. Large multinational firms will absorb the compliance costs; smaller companies—the ones driving innovation and offering specialized products—may not. The likely result is market consolidation and reduced consumer choice, particularly for practitioner-grade and niche formulations that don’t fit a mass-market model.

Supporters argue this will improve safety. But FDA already has robust authority to act against adulterated or misbranded supplements. The most serious risks in this space typically stem from illegal products that ignore existing law—not from a lack of paperwork. A sweeping new registry does little to address those bad actors, while imposing new hurdles on responsible companies trying to comply.

More concerning is what comes next. Once a centralized database is in place, the FDA can use the registry as a hit-list to go after supplements it doesn’t like. Maybe high-dose supplements are the first target. Maybe the FDA uses the list to go after supplements that haven’t complied with its over-expansive “new dietary ingredient” guidance (a policy that has yet to be finalized).

At stake here is whether consumers retain broad access to supplements and the freedom to make informed choices about their health. This bill may be framed as modest reform, but its real impact would be anything but modest.

Action Alert!

The post Durbin Bill Reappears: New Threat to Supplement Access first appeared on Alliance for Natural Health USA - Protecting Natural Health.

The current leadership of FDA may be softening its stance on peptides—but past patterns suggest the outcome is far from certain. Action Alert!

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THE TOPLINE

• Recent FDA activity—including a planned Pharmacy Compounding Advisory Committee (PCAC) review of peptides like BPC-157 and epitalon—along with changes to the Bulk Drug Substances List, signals a potential shift toward allowing broader access to compounded peptides.
• Despite encouraging signals, PCAC has historically taken a restrictive stance on natural compounds, often recommending limits or bans, raising concerns that the upcoming review may follow the same pattern.
• This process has favored FDA staff perspectives and could ultimately restrict access, reinforcing a pattern where natural therapies are sidelined while similar compounds later emerge as patented pharmaceuticals.

Access to some of the most promising emerging therapies in modern medicine is in peril. Behind the scenes, federal regulators are making decisions right now that could determine whether patients and practitioners can access natural peptide bioregulators—or whether those treatments are effectively pushed out of reach and into pharmaceutical monopolies or unregulated gray markets.

Following several signals from HHS Secretary RFK Jr. that the current administration will protect consumer access to compounded peptides, the FDA has taken two recent actions. A newly announced meeting of the Pharmacy Compounding Advisory Committee (PCAC) on July 23 and 24 has, as part of its agenda, a review of BPC-157 and epitalon. During the forthcoming meeting, the committee will make a recommendation to the FDA as to whether to allow these and other peptides to be compounded.

The FDA has also quietly taken another step: certain peptides are being removed from “Category 2” of the Bulk Drug Substances List which contains substances flagged for safety concerns. Removing peptides from this list is a positive signal that past biases against peptides are being corrected.

Taken together, these developments suggest movement. But whether they will produce meaningful progress remains to be seen.

A Window of Opportunity—Or More of the Same?

We know that RFK Jr. has made public statements in favor of retaining consumer access to peptides. The PCAC, however, has neither been friendly to natural substances in general, nor to peptides in particular.

Historically, the committee has taken a restrictive view of many natural substances, often aligning closely with FDA staff recommendations. PCAC has voted to ban the compounding of curcumin, aloe vera, and a host of other safe, natural compounds. It’s been much the same with peptides so far: PCAC has rejected several peptides for inclusion on the Bulks List, including thymosin alpha-1, despite decades of research supporting its immunological benefits.

ANH attended these PCAC meetings, and time and again we’ve been left with the impression that it is a rigged process. FDA staff are given hours to present the case for why natural substances should be banned from compounding. By contrast, those offering the alternative view are given 15 minutes to present their case for why each peptide should be permitted in compounding.

To be clear, PCAC’s vote is a recommendation. The FDA must go through the formal rulemaking process to ban these substances from compounding. But with RFK Jr.’s public statements in support of peptides, we hope this round of meetings will be different and the process will go beyond the kangaroo court of previous meetings.

A Familiar Pattern

You can reference our previous coverage for how we’ve ended up here. But it’s a familiar story. Natural substances with therapeutic promise are restricted due to theoretical safety risks and/or limited data, even when real-world harm is minimal or undocumented. At the same time, those same compounds often re-emerge later as patented pharmaceutical products.

This dynamic raises a fundamental question: is the FDA really concerned about safety, or about protecting pharmaceutical company profits?

Vigilance Required

There’s no question that recent developments are encouraging. A reopened docket, active FDA review, and signals from political leadership all point to the possibility of change.

Yet the PCAC process has historically narrowed access, not expanded it. If there is to be a genuine shift toward responsible, transparent access to peptides, it won’t happen automatically. It will require continued scrutiny, public engagement, and a willingness to challenge decisions that limit patient choice without clear evidence of harm.

Action Alert!

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A looming FDA rule could overhaul how everyday ingredients are regarded by the agency —putting thousands of supplements and natural products at risk of disappearing behind regulatory red tape. Action Alert!

THE TOPLINE

• A new FDA rule on the GRAS (Generally Recognized as Safe) system is under review, and could significantly change how ingredients are allowed to enter the marketplace—potentially affecting access to thousands of supplements and food ingredients.
• The proposal would likely require mandatory FDA notification for all GRAS determinations, ending “self-GRAS,” which could increase transparency but also overwhelm the agency and create major backlogs.
• Eliminating self-GRAS—the approach Secretary Kennedy has HHS Secretary has consistently reiterated—could restrict access to safe, natural ingredients and stifle innovation. Reform should focus on transparency and risk-based oversight—not a burdensome pre-approval system.

An update to the FDA’s Generally Recognized as Safe (GRAS) framework is around the corner. The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) has reportedly scheduled a meeting for April 20, 2026, to review a proposed rule that could significantly reshape how GRAS determinations are handled in the United States.

It may sound very “in the weeds” to be talking about GRAS. But what’s at stake is your access to thousands of safe, health-promoting ingredients; if we get the wrong kind of GRAS reform, they could disappear in the churn of a bureaucratic approval system. (For background on what GRAS is and how we got here, and how we think reform could be done in ways that work for everyone other than those selling harmful ingredients, you can check out our white paper.)

At this stage, full details of the rule have not been released, but we must stay vigilant and engaged to make sure the rule promotes transparency and supports consumer access to safe, natural ingredients, rather than installing additional bureaucratic red tape that eliminates supplement access.

What the Proposed Rule May Do

The proposed rule would require mandatory submission of GRAS notices to the FDA, effectively ending the practice of “self-affirmed GRAS” determinations that are not disclosed to the agency. (As we’ve explained in previous coverage, self-affirmed GRAS, or “self-GRAS”, is when a company independently concludes an ingredient is GRAS without FDA notification.)

Certain substances will be exempt from this requirement—namely, those already listed as GRAS by regulation or those that have already received an FDA “no questions” letter. The FDA would also maintain and update a public-facing inventory of GRAS notices, providing greater visibility into which substances are being used and on what basis they have been deemed safe.

The rule is also expected to clarify how the FDA determines that a substance is not GRAS, an area that has long lacked clear procedural guidance.

Problems With the Rule

At first glance, some of this sounds like the kind of transparency reform for which ANH has long advocated. But abolishing the self-GRAS pathway would be a huge mistake, as we outlined in our white paper last year.

Depending on how it’s done, abolishing the self-GRAS pathway creates more problems than it solves. Consider the fact that there are currently an estimated 10,000+ ingredients on the market today that are self-GRAS, many of them perfectly safe and natural supplement ingredients. If all of these are going to be forced through a mandatory FDA approval system, the agency would be overwhelmed, creating years, if not decades, of regulatory backlog.

Worse, this kind of blanket approach would likely sweep safe, beneficial ingredients off the market alongside risky ones, reducing consumer access to health-promoting products and potentially harming public health. It would also stifle innovation, particularly for smaller companies that rely on the flexibility of self-GRAS to bring new ingredients to market.

The issue is not the GRAS pathway itself, but the lack of transparency. The public and independent scientists should be able to review the data underlying self-GRAS determinations. But rather than creating a pre-approval regime, reform should focus on shining light on GRAS determinations and prioritizing enforcement against ingredients that pose a demonstrated risk.

>>>Read ANH’s GRAS Reform White Paper

Creating another de facto pre-approval system undermines the original purpose of the GRAS pathway: to streamline the introduction of safe ingredients, including many natural ingredients, into food.

Reform Done Right

There is broad agreement that the GRAS system needs reform. The current lack of transparency allows for potential abuse, and the public deserves greater visibility.

But eliminating self-GRAS entirely would “throw the baby out with the bathwater,” removing a pathway that has enabled the development of many safe and beneficial products.

ANH has outlined a better path forward in its white paper, Reforming GRAS: Food Safety Without Sacrifice, which proposes a tiered, risk-based approach to ingredient review. This model would focus regulatory resources where they are most needed while preserving access and innovation.

Waiting for the Details

The upcoming OMB meeting signals that change is imminent. But until the proposed rule is formally released, key questions remain unanswered.

Will the FDA strike the right balance between transparency and access? Or will it move closer to the burdensome, pre-approval frameworks being pushed in Congress?

For now, the only responsible position is cautious optimism—tempered by vigilance.

We will continue to monitor developments closely and provide updates as more information becomes available.

Action Alert!

The post GRAS Reform on the Horizon: What We Know—and What We Don’t first appeared on Alliance for Natural Health USA - Protecting Natural Health.

Big Food has been trying to weather increasing evidence that UPFs cause harm. We think we’re beyond the tipping point – UPFs are slowly killing those who depend on them for sustenance – it’s a Big Tobacco moment for Big Food.

By Rob Verkerk PhD, founder, executive & scientific director

If you’re reading this, chances are you already try to avoid ultra-processed foods (UPFs), recognizing UPFs contain ingredients you wouldn’t want in your own kitchen.

But many of your friends, family, and wider networks may not be in the same place—and crucially, may still believe that the science is “uncertain.” That’s because Big Food has spent many years trying to defend its position to use these ingredients and has ploughed vast sums into research and marketing, a chunk of which has been used to justify its position.

But that position is increasingly hard to defend—as we aim to show in this article, using some of the most prominent systematic reviews and meta-analyses published in mainstream, high-impact scientific journals.

Where we are today—something I hope to justify below—is that we’ve arrived at a Big Tobacco moment for Big Food—the same playbook, different story and era. 

When you can no longer hide from the science

A pivotal shift came in 2025 when the highly influential peer-reviewed journal, The Lancet, published an article by Monteiro et al. along with 12 linked articles. In their opener for the series, Professor Carlos A Monteiro, MD and colleagues from the University of Sao Paulo, Brazil, set out three biologically plausible mechanisms by which UPFs may drive harm:

• Disruption of appetite regulation, leading to overconsumption
• Direct biological effects of additives, altered food structures, and production of harmful byproducts
• Systematic displacement of health-promoting, minimally processed, protective foods

What we’re beginning to see now is a converging causal framework for how UPFs represent a classic slow-kill mechanism that underpins most of the chronic disease we see in industrialized societies that steals years and quality from lives, and threatens to overrun health systems.

Engineered to override satiety

Among the most compelling experimental evidence comes from a tightly controlled inpatient trial led by NIH researcher Kevin Hall. Participants consuming an ultra-processed diet ate ~500 kcal/day more and gained weight compared with those on a minimally processed diet—despite meals being matched for calories, sugar, fat, and fiber (Hall et al 2019).

This isn’t about someone’s willpower. It’s about design—foods designed to be addictive that create dependence. Texture, energy density, and hyper-palatability appear to bypass normal satiety signaling—directly supporting Monteiro’s first hypothesis.

The epidemiology is now overwhelming

Among the strongest syntheses of evidence to date comes from a systematic review and meta-analysis of 43 observational studies (including nearly 900,000 subjects) examining UPFs and chronic disease outcomes published by Lane et al 2021 in the peer-reviewed journal, Obesity Reviews.

The findings were striking:

• Higher UPF intake was associated with increased risk of obesity, cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes, and all-cause mortality
• Associations persisted across populations and study designs

Even allowing for residual confounding, the scale and reproducibility of these findings make dismissal increasingly untenable.

In case anyone is still in any doubt, a very recent meta-analysis and systematic review by Liang et al (2025) published in Systematic Reviews including 18 studies involving over 1 million subjects (and over 173,000 deaths), showed unequivocally that those who consumed the most UPFs had a 15% increase in risk of death from all causes. 

Sorry, Big Food, you can no longer hide from the evidence that it’s UPFs that make-up over half the total energy consumed by populations in the US and UK (here and here), are killing consumers of its products slowly, but surely. More to the point, the risks are dose dependent—so any effort to eat less of it moves your risk profile in the right direction.   

From pre-cradle to old age

The problem is akin to a ticking time bomb. We have yet to see the full age spectrum of industrialized societies exposed to UPFs from pre-conception to death.

What we know for sure is that young people are eating more of the stuff than older folk, and that should be a big wake-up call for individuals, families, and health authorities. The data also show that it’s the middle income groups that consume the most, not the poorest, this likely reflecting the relatively high cost of many UPFs.  

The science is increasingly revealing that harms are not confined to any one life stage—they impact people across the lifespan:

• Children and adolescents: High UPF consumption is linked to increased adiposity, poorer metabolic health, and emerging links to mental health outcomes. Early exposure may also shape lifelong food preferences (Lane et al 2021)
• Older adults: Recent evidence links higher UPF intake with frailty, cognitive decline, and increased mortality risk, suggesting acceleration of biological ageing (Shahatah et al 2025)
  
  But, that’s not all. UPFs have also been tied to reducing fertility, elevated risks during pregnancy and development of fetuses and infants.

Emerging research suggests UPFs may impair hormonal regulation, metabolic signaling, and fertility outcomes, including in males (Paula et al, 2022; Evans et al 2025; Preston et al 2025). While still developing, this aligns with known effects of metabolic dysfunction and inflammation on reproductive biology.

During pregnancy, the risks extend further. Maternal UPF intake has been linked to excess gestational weight gain and altered fetal development trajectories, raising concerns about long-term metabolic programming in offspring (Paula et al, 2022; Morales-Suarez-Varela & Rocha-Velasco 2025). 

As shown in a comprehensive review by Rondinella et al 2025, common UPF components—particularly emulsifiers, artificial sweeteners, and other additives in UPFs—can:

• Disrupt microbiome diversity
• Damage the intestinal barrier
• Promote systemic inflammation

This provides a biologically coherent explanation linking UPFs to chronic disease pathways—from metabolic disorders to neurodegeneration.

This is not just about individual health or the choices, informed or otherwise, of the individual—what parents and young people are eating will likely also influence the health of the next generation.

Coming back to the story of Big Tobacco, we learned that the industry “got away with it” up until it was no longer feasible for its leaders to deny causation. Now, with Big Food and its addictive UPFs, we see a similar progression: the increasing evidence of consistency of effects across the entire life course is really beginning to bolster the case for causality.

UPF manufacture generates killer chemicals

Critics are right: not all processing is harmful. Fermentation, freezing, and cooking can enhance nutrition and safety.

But ultra-processing is different. It involves fractionation and recombination of food components, technological additives designed to mimic real food, and structural changes that alter digestion and absorption.

As Prof. Monteiro and colleagues propose in their second hypothesis, UPF manufacture may often also involve application of extreme heat or other technological processes that induce reactions that in turn yield new by-products. This generates chemicals that were not in the original foodthat are associated with increased inflammation, neurotoxicity, and cancer risk.  

Even when adjusting for overall diet quality, studies continue to find independent associations between UPF intake and adverse health outcomes.

This suggests that UPFs are not merely markers of unhealthy diets—they are likely contributors to harm in their own right.

Time for honesty and accountability—not ‘healthwashing’

The food industry has long argued that “there are no bad foods, only bad diets.” That argument is becoming increasingly hard to sustain. Big Food’s response? “Healthwashing.”

Despite the growing body of negative scientific findings, food manufacturers, like their tobacco counterparts of yesteryear, are becoming increasingly adept at marketing ultra-processed products as part of a healthy lifestyle. Labels such as “high protein”, “low fat”, “gut friendly” or “plant-based” can create a powerful halo effect, even when the product remains highly processed.

Social media has amplified this phenomenon. Influencers, including celebrities and sports personalities, are frequently paid to promote food and drink products, blurring the line between genuine advice and advertising. The result is a digital landscape in which ultra-processed foods are not only normalized but actively positioned as desirable wellness choices.

At a systems level, there is a need to rebuild shorter, more transparent food chains that reconnect producers and consumers. Supporting regenerative agriculture, local food networks, and independent producers can play an important role in shifting the balance away from industrialized food systems. This is where we, as consumers, can play a powerful role in creating change in our food landscape by changing what we buy and where we buy from.

Policy change is equally critical. This includes developing more robust and meaningful ways to classify food, strengthening oversight of health claims—particularly in digital spaces—and investing in independent research that is free from commercial influence.

Time to reclaim real food

The debate around ultra-processed foods is both necessary and timely. But if it is to lead to meaningful change, it must move beyond simplistic narratives and address the deeper forces shaping our food system.

It’s time for people to engage, question and advocate for a more holistic approach—one that values real food, informed choice, and transparency at every level. Because ultimately, improving public health is not just about avoiding certain categories of food, but about rebuilding a system that truly nourishes both people and planet.

We cannot win this one without education. People have to know what they’re putting into their bodies and be cognizant of the ‘healthwashing’ that Big Food uses in its marketing, advertising and labelling.

Next we need to vote with our pockets – the message is a simple one: avoid UPFs most of the time. 

Those wanting to go minimal-UPF or UPF-free need to focus on eating whole foods and ingredients that can be recognized as foods. If you want some help, a great starting point is our book Reset Eating: Reset your health and resilience by turning what and how you eat into powerful medicine and our Food4Health Guide within. Find out more below.

>>> Discover Reset Eating from the ANH team, your science-based guide to healthy, UPF-free eating that supports balanced nutrition—whatever your dietary preferences.

>>> For more information on using unprocessed ingredients for healthy UPF-free eating check out our Food4Health guide. For kids under 6, see our Food4Kids guide.

The post Ultra-Processed Foods Are Killing Us Slowly: Why Big Food Can No Longer Ignore the Science first appeared on Alliance for Natural Health USA - Protecting Natural Health.

A new national declaration headed by ANH-USA calls for rethinking how we prevent and treat chronic illness that affects 3 in every 4 US adults. Add your name to support reform. Take Action – Co-Sign the Declaration Now!

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THE TOPLINE

• On February 10–11, 2026, we convened a summit comprised of healthcare, legal, scientific, and policy leaders in Scottsdale, Arizona, which culminated in the drafting of a declaration calling for structural reform of how America addresses chronic disease that is at risk of crippling society and breaking health systems.
• The Arizona Statement outlines legal, regulatory, and economic barriers that can limit access to preventive and non-pharmaceutical approaches—and proposes a path forward.
• This is a growing national effort that was among RJK Jr.’s key priorities when appointed HHS Secretary. He can’t do it alone. Add your name to help demonstrate public support for change.

The Arizona Statement has been released today!

>>> Read Press Release

The United States spends more on healthcare per capita than any country in the world—yet continues to struggle with high rates of chronic disease.

Conditions like diabetes, heart disease, and obesity now affect a majority of American adults. At the same time, many researchers and public health experts agree that a significant share of this burden is linked to diet, lifestyle, and other modifiable factors.

So why does prevention so often take a back seat?

The answer is complex. But many clinicians, researchers, and policy experts point to a common theme: the way our healthcare system is structured can make it harder to prioritize prevention and early intervention.

Natural and preventive approaches to health are at the margins of healthcare through the deliberate structure of legal definitions, regulatory enforcement, and professional gatekeeping that has been constructed—and defended—over decades.

That’s the challenge at the heart of the Arizona Statement on Reversing America’s Chronic Disease Epidemic, developed by ANH-USA with the help of a cross-disciplinary group of experts who met in February 2026 and have collaborated since. Now, we’re asking grassroots activists to help build momentum behind these ideas.

While an Executive Order established the Make America Health Again (MAHA) Commission in February 2025 and a 120-initiative strategy was launched in September 2025, to date the focus has been primarily on children’s health; the structural problems that impact informed choice and health freedom relevant to America’s 277 million adults has largely been avoided. Not only that, the chronic disease epidemic cannot be fixed by top-down government policy alone. It requires all layers of society to be involved and the removal of structural barriers that have accumulated over decades that work to protect Big Pharma and Big Food—with US citizens paying the price both in health and economic terms.

What the Arizona Statement Argues

The Statement does not reject modern medicine or the role of pharmaceuticals. Instead, it argues that the current system often underutilizes lower-cost, lower-risk approaches—including nutrition, lifestyle interventions, sanitation, and natural products—due to a combination of regulatory constraints and economic incentives.

Among the issues it raises:

• Individual liberty and informed choice. Every person has the right to receive truthful information about nutrition, lifestyle, and lawful health options—and to choose among them on the basis of fully informed consent. That right is currently being violated by a regulatory regime that decides what you’re allowed to know and what medicines you can access.
• Modern, science-based definitions. The legal definitions of “food” and “drug” that govern what can be said and sold in the American marketplace were not written with 21st-century nutritional science in mind. The Statement calls for modernizing these definitions so that foods, botanicals, and dietary ingredients with demonstrated therapeutic effects can be researched, discussed, and recommended without being classified as unapproved drugs.
• Prevention, root-cause care. America’s great gains in life expectancy over the 20th century were built on sanitation, nutrition, hygiene, and public health — not on pharmaceuticals. The Statement calls for restoring prevention and root-cause medicine to their rightful place at the center of health policy.
• Barriers to access and reimbursement. Many preventive or root-cause approaches are not covered by insurance programs, making them less accessible—even when they may reduce long-term health costs.

These ideas are not about replacing conventional medicine, but about broadening the toolkit available to patients and practitioners.

Why This Matters in Practice

For many Americans, this debate is not abstract. It can mean the difference between having insurance cover a medication that brings side effects, but not a safer nutrition-based intervention. It’s the difference between treating symptoms rather than the underlying or root causes. It’s about having the right to be informed about, and to choose, non-drug approaches to health.

The Arizona Statement argues that a more balanced system could improve outcomes, expand choice, and reduce long-term costs.

A Growing Coalition—And a Chance to Add Your Voice

The Statement has already been signed by a number of clinicians, researchers, attorneys, nonprofit leaders, and health advocates. The goal now is to demonstrate that these concerns extend beyond professional circles.

Your signature helps show policymakers, regulators, and the media that there is broader public support for rethinking how we approach chronic disease.

This list of signatories will support ongoing legal, regulatory, and legislative efforts aimed at expanding access to preventive and integrative approaches.

Add Your Name to the Arizona Statement…

• If you believe prevention should play a larger role in healthcare…
• If you support greater access to information and a wider range of options…
• If you think the system can do more to address the root causes of chronic disease…

Add your name to the Arizona Statement TODAY.

Once you’ve done this – please forward this email or share the URL arizonastatement.org. Help build the momentum for a more balanced, prevention-focused approach to health.

You can also find out more by tuning in to the Robert Scott Bell Show today at 3 pm ET (noon PT) and listen to our General Counsel Jonathan Emord and Executive & Scientific Director Rob Verkerk, the key authors of the Arizona Statement.

The post Sign the Arizona Statement: Join the Bottom-Up Movement to Reverse Chronic Disease first appeared on Alliance for Natural Health USA - Protecting Natural Health.

Patients relying on natural thyroid therapies face renewed uncertainty as the agency doubles down on its impending ban. Action Alert!

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THE TOPLINE

• The FDA’s March announcement makes clear that natural desiccated thyroid (NDT) is not eligible for compounding, escalating the threat to patient access.
• The agency plans to issue formal compliance guidance by August 2026, giving a clearer timeline for enforcement.
• The FDA’s reasoning is scientifically and legally inconsistent, and is advancing a strategy to protect access through regulatory, legal, and legislative pathways.

In a late-March statement, the FDA doubled down on its plans to restrict access to natural thyroid treatments. This includes commercial products like Armour Thyroid as well as compounded NDT medicines. The move is a blatant betrayal of the Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) movement that will leave millions of patients who rely on NDT in the lurch.

The FDA’s position is that NDT products are biologics, not drugs, under the Public Health Service Act, and thus require an approved Biologics License Application (BLA); no commercial NDT products are currently marketed under an approved BLA. By law, biologics cannot be compounded by traditional compounding pharmacies. The FDA has indicated it intends to issue formal compliance guidance by August 2026.

We must band together to protect patient access to compounded NDT.

A Direct Threat to Compounded Care

As we noted last year, FDA Commissioner Makary provided positive signals for FDA approval of a commercial NDT product, pending clinical trial results.

But even if some commercial NDT products eventually win FDA approval, compounded thyroid therapies are still on the chopping block. For many patients, compounded NDT is essential. Thyroid disorders are highly individualized, and patients often require customized dosing, specific T3/T4 ratios, and/or alternative delivery forms. These needs cannot be met by one-size-fits-all, mass-produced drugs—should they ever get approved.

If the FDA’s position stands, practitioners will lose the ability to tailor care, and patients who do not respond well to synthetic drugs will be left without viable options.

FDA’s Biologics Argument—And a Key Inconsistency

The FDA’s classification of NDT as a biologic rests in part on the presence of thyroglobulin, a protein found in animal thyroid tissue used to make NDT. But this argument raises serious questions.

In desiccated thyroid products, thyroglobulin is an inactive component. The primary therapeutic agents, typically standardized in specific ratios, are actually the thyroid hormones thyroxine (T4) and tri-iodothyronine (T3). Natural porcine or bovine NDT typically also contain small amounts of monoiodothyronine (T1), diiodothyronine (T2) and traces of reverse T3.

The FDA’s own guidance has previously acknowledged that a product containing a protein only as an inactive ingredient is not considered a “protein” for purposes of biologic classification. By asserting that the mere presence of thyroglobulin makes NDT a biologic, the agency is departing from its own precedent. These and other arguments were raised in a Citizen Petition filed by the Alliance for Pharmacy Compounding, a trade group for compounding pharmacists.

ANH-USA’s Strategy

In response to this dire threat to patient autonomy, ANH-USA has developed a comprehensive advocacy strategy outlined in a position paper we released in September 2025. The basic contours of the plan are as follows:

Short-term: Press the FDA and HHS to reclassify NDT as a drug, restoring legal pathways for compounding.

Medium-term: Secure enforcement discretion for high-quality, GMP-manufactured NDT products.

Long-term: Advance federal legislation creating a durable carveout to protect both compounded and commercial thyroid therapies.

We believe this plan provides the best chance to retain access to compounded NDT.

The Bigger Picture

The threat to compounded thyroid treatments is part and parcel of a broader regulatory trend in which the FDA increasingly applies drug (or biologic) frameworks to natural and individualized therapies, regardless of their long history of safe use.

The result is a system that limits physician flexibility, reduces patient choice, and favors standardized, patentable products.

For patients with individualized needs, these constraints can have real and lasting health consequences.

What Comes Next

With formal FDA guidance expected by August 2026, the window to influence policy is narrowing.

With your help, ANH-USA will continue to apply grassroots pressure on decision-makers to make compounded NDT available to patients.

Action Alert!

The post FDA’s Anti-MAHA Stance on Natural Thyroid first appeared on Alliance for Natural Health USA - Protecting Natural Health.

What if the information you need to manage or recover from a health condition already exists—but that information is deliberately being concealed from you?

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THE TOPLINE

• U.S. regulations classify foods and supplements as “drugs” if they’re linked to disease claims—preventing companies from sharing vast amounts of high-quality scientific evidence about their benefits and leaving consumers uninformed.
• Because natural substances can’t be patented and FDA approval is prohibitively expensive, the framework reinforces a drug-first healthcare model despite poor national health outcomes.
• Regulatory barriers discourage the funding of research on nutrient-disease interactions and limit public access to findings, creating a structural problem that undermines prevention and consumer empowerment.

Right now, you can walk into a store and buy supplements like curcumin, omega-3s, or vitamin D. But the companies selling these—and hundreds of other supplements—are legally barred from telling you what the science actually says about how they may help restore your body to health. This isn’t because the evidence is weak—it’s because the law says they can’t.

This isn’t just a technicality. The United States spends more on healthcare than any other nation, yet delivers the worst outcomes in the industrialized world with healthy life expectancy currently ranking 80^th globally, with a predicted drop to 108^th by 2050. At the heart of this is a legal framework that effectively writes into law that food cannot be considered medicine. Yes, the statement “Let Thy Food Be Thy Medicine”, often misattributed to Hippocrates, is illegal if associated with an “article” of food or a dietary supplement (i.e., a commercial product).

Speaking to this dilemma, Rob Verkerk, Ph.D., ANH-USA’s executive & scientific director said, “This categorization currently works in favor of both Big Food and Big Pharma, but against the public interest. Big Food gets to make and sell products that generate disease; Big Pharma then gets to maintain its monopoly on the products that can be used to treat the condition or disease. All good if Big Pharma’s products delivered the best outcomes, but the science tells a different story.”

Until these laws can be modernized using the totality of science available in the 21^st century, thousands or even millions of Americans will miss out on treatment or prevention approaches that offer the best trade off between effectiveness and risk.

The Legal Trap

Under U.S. law, a product becomes a “drug” if it’s said to diagnose, treat, or prevent disease. That means if a company tells you curcumin helps with inflammation, that simple statement of fact turns the product into an unapproved drug that can then be removed from the market. This is, by way of example, precisely what happened to cherry and walnut growers who linked to peer-reviewed studies describing the health benefits of those products.

In order to say a food or supplement can treat or prevent a disease, you would need to go through FDA drug approval. For natural substances that can’t be patented, that process, which typically costs in the order of $1 billion and takes a decade, is just not feasible. So companies stay silent, and consumers—and even many physicians and other health practitioners—remain in the dark about how foods and supplements can help people recover their health without using licensed drugs. This classification also prevents nutrients from being reimbursable through insurance, or being prescribed through Medicare or Medicaid. Put simply, it’s a deliberate stitch up.

These laws allow pharmaceutical companies to monopolize healthcare, both in legal terms and in the minds of most citizens and physicians. This is why drugs are our first line of defense even though they are recognized as the third leading cause of death in the US and Europe.

The Research Bottleneck

The system also makes it harder to even study natural substances.

Rules designed for new synthetic drugs are being applied to everyday nutrients. Researchers studying something as simple as probiotics or vitamin D may have to go through the same process as a company developing a brand-new pharmaceutical if the research involves how a natural product can treat or prevent a disease.

Many scientists simply can’t get the funding to pursue this research because it’s too costly and time-consuming—especially early-career researchers. Funders know they won’t be able to get sufficient a return on investment because they know they’ll never be able to use the fruits of the research when linked to specific products.

That means fewer studies and less evidence about how we can use food as medicine.

Editor’s note: In 2022, the FDA issued a proposed rule that would, in certain circumstances, exempt researchers evaluating nutrients or food components from the IND requirement. This is a significant step forward that ANH-USA played a key role in achieving. However, it remains a proposed rule only — it has not yet been finalized. The previous IND requirement remains in effect until a final rule is published.

A Structural Problem—Not a Personal One

We’re often told that chronic disease is the result of personal choices, but that framing overlooks these deeper, structural problems. People cannot make informed decisions when they’re denied access to information in the first place. At the same time, scientists struggle to build the evidence needed to guide better health outcomes when research is blocked or discouraged.

How ANH is Working to Change the Rules

We won’t solve the chronic disease crisis by telling people to “make better choices” while denying them access to truthful, science-based information about the products that may help prevent, manage, or recover from disease. 

Real progress requires three things: scientists must be free to study nutrients and other natural substances without drug-style barriers; companies must be allowed to communicate lawful, evidence-based information about their products; and patients and practitioners must be able to access lower-risk natural options that are affordable and clinically relevant.

That is why ANH is advancing a coordinated reform agenda: modernizing outdated legal definitions, expanding appropriate use of medical foods and compounded medicines, protecting nutrition research from drug-style restrictions, and advancing a genuine right to try for patients and practitioners alike.

This is not just about market access. It is about restoring scientific integrity, informed choice, and a health system that serves people instead of protecting entrenched commercial interests. ANH is working to change that system—and with enough public pressure, it can be changed.

Please share this story widely in your networks, and consider donating to support our work.

The post The Drug Definition Trap: Why US Law Blocks Truthful Information That Could Help You Recover Your Health first appeared on Alliance for Natural Health USA - Protecting Natural Health.

High blood pressure was something that only affected older people. Now we see levels rising in young people creating both pathology and future risk. In this article, we look at what’s driving it and what parents can do to prevent it.

By Chimnonso Onyekwelu LLB, and Meleni Aldridge BSc NutrMed PgDip CPNI

Edited by Michael Ames-Sikora

Listen to the audio version of this story

In just 20 years, the number of children and young people with high blood pressure (HBP) has nearly doubled. Once seen as an adult problem, it now shows up in classrooms, playgrounds, and routine pediatric visits. According to The Lancet Child & Adolescent Health, prevalence rose from 3.4% in 2000 to 6.5% in 2020—over 114 million young people affected. This surge begs a question: are kids truly sicker, or are we simply casting a wider diagnostic net?

A key turning point came in 2017 when the American Academy of Pediatrics updated its guidelines. The new rules simplified blood pressure categories for teens and aligned thresholds more closely with adults. Millions of previously “healthy” teens instantly moved into “at risk” or hypertensive groups.

With blood pressure rising so sharply, shouldn’t prevention take as much priority as treatment? Too often, new drugs arrive faster than efforts to stop children from becoming unwell in the first place.

Understanding High Blood Pressure and The Expanding Diagnostic Net

Simple, HBP, or hypertension, occurs when the force of blood against artery walls remains consistently elevated. Over time, this extra strain forces the heart to work harder, increasing the risk of long-term complications such as heart and kidney disease. In children, hypertension may be silent, often discovered only during routine check-ups, yet its effects can quietly set the stage for lifelong cardiovascular problems.

The 2017 American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) Clinical Practice Guideline marked a major shift from the 2004 Fourth Report. Among adolescents aged 13 and above, the guideline abandoned percentile-based thresholds, adopting fixed adult cut-points (≥120/80 mm Hg for elevated BP and ≥130/80 mm Hg for hypertension). It replaced “prehypertension” with the broader “elevated blood pressure” label and recalculated percentiles using only normal-weight children, effectively lowering thresholds for younger children. These changes may have simplified the diagnosis but also mean that more children now cross the threshold into elevated or high blood pressure ranges.

The impact is striking. A 2023 study shows that under the 2017 guidelines, the prevalence of hypertension in adolescents rose from 8.4% to 12.9%, elevated BP from 6.1% to 13.8%, and overall high BP from 14.5% to 26.7%. While these numbers partly reflect guideline changes rather than an abrupt rise in illness, they show how redefining ‘normal’ can suddenly label millions of otherwise healthy children as needing monitoring and intervention.

Other Drivers of High Blood Pressure in Children

Apart from the apparent rise caused by the 2017 AAP guideline, several well-established factors directly contribute to high blood pressure in children and young people. At the center of this is obesity — consistently identified as the strongest predictor of blood pressure rising above the 90th or 95th percentile (the cut-offs for elevated BP and hypertension). Multiple studies (here and here) have shown that obesity alone significantly increases a child’s risk, with more than 30% of obese boys (and up to 42% in some ethnic groups) and 23–30% of obese girls meeting the criteria for high or borderline blood pressure. A large meta-analysis also found that obese children were six times more likely to have elevated blood pressure than those of normal weight.

A Guide to Children’s Blood Pressure

Physical inactivity and long hours of sedentary behavior add another layer of risk. Children who do not meet the recommended minimum 60 minutes of daily activity, or who sit for more than two hours a day, show higher rates of both pre-hypertension and hypertension during follow-up. 

Diet plays a similar role: high-sodium foods, processed and ultra-processed meals, sugary drinks, and low intake of fruits, vegetables and fiber, all contribute indirectly by promoting weight gain and raising long-term cardiovascular risk. Poor sleep quality and sleep-related breathing problems also play a part, especially in children who are already overweight.

There are also medical causes that, while less common, are important to recognize. These include kidney disease, congenital or acquired heart problems, thyroid or adrenal disorders, diabetes, inherited conditions, and even chronic stress. In such cases, high blood pressure can appear regardless of weight, making proper evaluation essential when readings persist above the expected percentile ranges.

The Hidden Toll of Hypertension in Childhood

HBP in childhood is not a temporary phase that children ‘grow out of’. Research (here and here) consistently shows that children with raised systolic readings have a 3–4-fold higher likelihood of becoming hypertensive adults. Hypertension remains the most widespread non-communicable disease globally, and its earliest footprints are often laid down long before adulthood. Elevated BP in young people already increases their future risk of heart attack, stroke and kidney disease—conditions once thought to belong only to older age.

The structural effects on the body begin alarmingly early. In one study of 130 children and adolescents with BP above the 90th percentile, only 45% had a normal heart muscle size, while 14% had severe thickening linked to a four-fold rise in cardiovascular complications in adults. Other early warning signs—higher urinary albumin, retinal vessel changes, subtle cognitive impacts and early atherosclerotic changes—have also been reported. Short-term risks can be just as concerning, including persistent headaches, vision disturbances, vomiting, seizures and silent kidney strain. All of this confirms that childhood high BP is far from harmless; it is an early signal of a body already under pressure.

Practical and Natural Ways to Lower Blood Pressure in Children

It is worrying that a condition once seen almost exclusively in adults is now showing up in children and at such alarming rates. Somewhere along the way, we normalized reaching for medication before addressing the root causes, even in young people whose bodies are still developing. Children should not be carrying the burden of diseases driven largely by modern lifestyles, nor should drugs become the default solution for every health concern. We owe them better than that. Especially when in many cases, HBP—and the creation of chronic disease—is wholly preventable.

This is why ANH’s work to open a true pathway to prevention is so critical. There is substantial evidence that a range of low-cost supplements—magnesium, fish oil, CoQ10, resveratrol, quercetin, and others—can support healthy blood pressure. Yet, due to the FDA’s restrictive interpretation of the law, this information cannot be communicated on product labels.

Why? Because even accurate, science-backed statements about a nutrient’s role in lowering blood pressure are classified as “disease claims”—and only drugs are permitted to make those claims.

The result is a regulatory double standard that sends a clear, if unspoken, message: supplements can’t help you—turn to pharmaceuticals instead.

ANH is working to change this. We will soon be filing a legal petition aimed at restoring the ability to share truthful, non-misleading information about the health benefits of nutrients. Stay tuned.

So how do we begin to turn the tide and support children in ways that strengthen health rather than simply manage disease? 

Below are practical, research-supported steps to help reclaim a child’s health:

Weight reduction (if overweight or obese): For obesity-related hypertension, even modest weight loss can significantly lower BP. Begin with gradual, sustainable adjustments rather than strict or restrictive diets and pay close attention to the possibility of emotional eating patterns. See ANH’s Food4Kids guidelines for more information and further articles here, here, and here.

Daily physical activity: Children should be active. It’s their natural evolutionary norm. Sedentary behavior is not and will result in pathology. Aim for a minimum of 60 minutes of moderate to vigorous activity most days. Sports, brisk walking, cycling—anything that raises the heart rate counts and most importantly is fun! Active, fun, play is something that has largely been replaced with digital devices, but is far more important than many parents might realize. Active play influences brain structure, neurological processes and emotional resilience as well as lowering blood pressure and insulin levels and promoting better metabolic health (see studies here, here and here).

Reduce sedentary time: Closely linked to the previous point is the need to limit screen-based activities to less than two hours a day to lower BP and improve overall metabolic health. A child’s brain develops and enhances higher executive function through physical activity, play and learning how to successfully solve their own challenges. None of this happens in front of a digital screen.

Stress management: The effects of stress and trauma are insidious and affect the entire body given that the whole immune system is activated. The body doesn’t differentiate between physical or emotional wounding. In children who are rapidly growing, developing and laying down the neuronal circuitry that will form the foundation for how their respond to challenges through life, managing stress is essential. Story telling, breathwork and mindfulness practice along with physical activity out in nature can be useful antidotes. Helping children to recognize, feel, and process their emotions versus ignoring them, stuffing them deep inside or eating to drown them out, will reap myriad benefits throughout life.

Heart-healthy diet: Increase the child’s intake of fruits, vegetables, and fiber, while ensuring sufficient healthy fats and protein. Limit dairy intake if they show signs of intolerance and replace sugary and fizzy soda drinks with water. See ANH’s Food4Kids guidelines for more information and further articles here, here, and here.

Avoid ultra-processed foods: Limit packaged snacks, fast food, sweetened cereals and processed meats. These are high in sodium, sugar and unhealthy fats that can raise BP and contribute to weight gain. Choosing whole or minimally processed meals makes a noticeable difference.

Better sleep practices: Ensure children have the required number of hours of uninterrupted sleep in a pitch-dark room daily. This enhances cellular regeneration, gives the brain adequate rest to promote neuronal health and helps to address sleep issues early as poor sleep can elevate BP.

The American Academy of Sleep Medicine and the American Academy of Pediatrics concur on the following number of hours of sleep for healthy children:

• Infants (4–12 months): 12–16 hours (including naps)
• Toddlers (1–2 years): 11–14 hours (including naps)
• Preschoolers (3–5 years): 10–13 hours (including naps)
• School-age children (6–12 years): 9–12 hours
• Teenagers/adolescents (13–18 years): 8–10 hours

Family-based approaches: Children thrive when the entire family adopts healthier habits together. Shared meals, shared activity, fun, laughter and consistent routines dramatically improve outcomes.

>> See ANH’s Reset Eating book for more detailed information on how to keep the whole family healthy at any age using food as your first and most powerful medicine.

The post Why Are Our Children Developing High Blood Pressure — And How Do We Stop It? first appeared on Alliance for Natural Health USA - Protecting Natural Health.