A customer sent the following letter (after initially looking through this website):

Hi--

Your product is excellent and I have used it often. But after reading the articles you sent in your email, I have to say they are far too absolutist. Herbs have been used as medicine for thousands of years, long before modern chemistry. They have been used by indigenous peoples, and still are.

You give a list in the report of herbs that can be dangerous--almost no herb is left off the list! At the end of the list you cite WebMD, a website that operates from the perspective of diagnosing disease, not healing modalities. This is a form of coercion, to me--scare tactics that are not proven, though they do support western medical practice and theories.

To my mind, western medicine is a triumph when it comes to trauma care, and a travesty when it come to healing, for it promotes prescriptions and drugs instead of far milder and often successful herb--based remedies. This rejection of herbs outright in the article is a form of protective dogma I simply find rather ludicrous. We are part of the earth and its ecosystem--and plants are not our enemy. I agree that there are charlatans out there advertising supplements that can be harmful, but statistically, far more people die from doctor-based (and pharmaceutical company-based) prescriptions than from herbal supplements--at least in these United States.

In no way would I suggest people use herbal remedies without caution, but I can say right now that I would rather use them than follow the average doctor's orders, knowing as I do that doctors and most healthcare professionals rarely have any background in what the body needs to heal nor any in-depth awareness of herbal reactive properties--it isn't part of their medical studies or outlook--and they have generally little discernment regarding what drug salesmen tell them to use, as the current opioid epidemic and crisis has revealed. Their outlook is symptomatic, not preventative.

That said--I know your product is good and will continue to purchase it--I came to it after studying British medical practices where sulfate-based glucosamine is the norm. Thus I learned HCL was not beneficial. But your diatribe against natural medicine seems to me to be way off the charts.

Regards,

RC
Rhinebeck, NY

We are not saying every leaf is poison. We are saying a daily retail capsule is not the same object as a fresh preparation from a trained healer, and the outcome data now sit in emergency departments and transplant programs.

Geller AI et al. Emergency Department Visits for Adverse Events Related to Dietary Supplements. N Engl J Med. 2015;373:1531–1540.
Abstract: Based on 3,667 cases, an estimated 23,005 ED visits per year (95% CI 18,611–27,398) were attributed to dietary-supplement adverse events, with about 2,154 hospitalizations. After excluding unsupervised child ingestions, 65.9% of single-supplement visits involved herbal or complementary products. Weight-loss and energy products drove palpitations, chest pain, and tachycardia in young adults. NEJM

Navarro VJ et al. Liver injury from herbals and dietary supplements in the U.S. Drug-Induced Liver Injury Network. Hepatology. 2014;60(4):1399–1408.
Abstract: HDS liver injury rose from 7% to 20% of DILIN cases. Non-bodybuilding HDS injury was more often fatal or transplant-requiring than medication injury (13% vs 3%). PubMed · LiverTox

Ichim MC. The DNA-Based Authentication of Commercial Herbal Products Reveals Their Globally Widespread Adulteration. Front Pharmacol. 2019;10:1227.
Finding: 27% of 5,957 commercial herbal products from 37 countries failed a DNA identity check against the labeled species. Open access