related: I also remember a big story not long ago. NY state went after a bunch of supplement manufacturers, saying that DNA testing showed their herbal products did not contain any of the advertised products. But apparently there is a problem with that testing approach:
www.newyorker.com/tech/elements/dna-barcoding-new-york-dietary-supplementSomebody said...
Last week, however, New York’s attorney general, Eric Schneiderman, shattered consumer faith in this seemingly self-evident truth. In cease-and-desist letters sent to Walgreens, Walmart, Target, and GNC, Schneiderman announced that his office had commissioned tests on a range of echinacea supplements and found them to contain mostly rice and buttercup DNA, if they contained any plant material at all. Other store-brand supplements appeared to fare no better: Target’s valerian root showed traces of garlic and wild carrot but no valerian; Walgreens’ St. John’s wort consisted of garlic, rice, and dracaena, a houseplant; Walmart’s ginkgo biloba had only dracaena, mustard, wheat, and radish...........................
The group used a method known as DNA bar coding, which identifies an organism by a small segment of its mitochondrial DNA. ...................By federal law, all drugs that are sold in the United States must meet identity standards laid out by the U.S.P. These standards are developed by joint panels of academics, pharmaceutical-company representatives, and other experts. It is a lengthy, collaborative process that also incorporates a mandatory three-month public comment period. The same is not true of dietary supplements, which need only to be tested using, in the F.D.A.’s phrasing, “appropriate, scientifically valid methods.” The attorney general’s office seems to have decided that DNA bar coding fit the bill. The U.S.P., however, recommends a different method. Certifying an echinacea supplement, for instance, requires a battery of chemical tests that measure the presence or absence of particular phenols, alkylamides, and acids. Together, these can conclusively demonstrate the purity and strength of the active ingredient, irrespective of whether its genes are intact.
The U.S.P. does not currently recommend DNA bar coding in any of its standards. Alhough Giancaspro told me that he and his colleagues may add it to their tool kit in the future, he said that they “would never use it alone.” Dietary supplements aren’t always what they say they are, nor do they always do what they say they do. In this case, though, the attorney general’s office has picked the wrong weapons for the right fight.