Medicine Men

In the 19th and early 20th Century, medicine men selling potions made their rounds of large towns and small.  It made no matter to them that their cures were fake as long as a gullible public would buy.  That same fraud and naive public continue to exist today in the supplement industry.  There are good manufacturers and distributors of supplements that actually work, but along side of them are shysters who put anything in a bottle, make extravagant claims and reap sales from those who hope more than they think.  The government doesn’t regulate the field and insist on blind studies as it does for the pharmaceutical industry.  Hence, anyone can get away with just about anything.  It makes for poor PR for the supplement industry, and it demonstrates that the business is incapable of regulating itself.  What is needed is much-dreaded government oversight of the business.  It is safe to say many supplements marketed today wouldn’t pass a test for efficacy.  They are no more than hope in a bottle.