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Note:  Nana "Weedkiller" earlier submitted an identical post and
declined to respond to my rebuttals, which again follow.  She later
failed to respond to two challenges rebutting her post.  Then she
pledged to do so after returning from vacation.  But once again, here
she is fanatically posting the same material in a fresh thread
unencumbered by a balanced view of the facts.  I even took time to
interview the Poison Control Center staff, but she isn't interested.
Who makes these efforts to post about the "dangers" of natural
supplements and yet show no interest in discussing the material they
themselves raise as pertinent to others' health?  These behaviours are
typical of our resident Pharma Bloggers (see my "Warning: Industry is
Blogging These Forums to Protect Their Monopolies" in the m.h.a nwsgrp.
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Your subject line is a fabrication.  TESS does not collect
epidemiological medical data, it collects and catalogs poison control
reports.  Big difference.  I contacted Poison Control and interviewed a
specialist to be sure I understood the process.  Let's take a look at
how it works.  When a person contacts Poison Control, the caller is
surveyed with a few simple questions and a report documenting the call
is created. Naturally, any ingestible occuring within 24 hours prior to
the adverse medical event is noted.  If more than one item is
indicated, for instance aspirin and ginseng, both are catalogued.  Now
things get tricky.  Both items will be referenced, but only one will be
given greater weight as a "probable" cause of illness in the report.
What is the criteria for "probable" cause?  In MOST cases, since a
caller does not seek medical care, a medical examination never occurs.
That's important because it means the great majority of individuals --
at least 85% -- are never subject to any type of toxicology at all.
There is no way to know whether illness resulted from spoiled food,
stress, insect bite, chemical exposure, common medication, disease, or
bacteria-laden water.  As for instances in which a medical evaluation
*does* take place, a toxicology will suggest the likely cause of
illness and may attribute it to a particular substance or chemical.
But in most cases, "probable cause" is just someone's best guess.

There are rarely autopsies, and the few that occur are usually
performed in cases of suicide.  In those case, of course, a cause of
death can be determined with a high degree of accuracy.  And it's no
surprise that individuals determined to end it all will find a way to
do so.  With 98% of dietary supplements, however, downing an entire
bottle still won't be enough to kill you.

According to Poison Control in DC, just 2.4% of all human poisoning
reported  to them is associated with the *entire* spectrum of dietary
supplements. By contrast, 11.4% of all human poisoning is associated
with just **ONE class of pharmaceutical drugs** -- analgesics.  That
doesn't even count NSAIDS, anti-depressants, cold formulas, or other
common OTC drugs.

When an OTC or prescription drug is taken in addition to a vitamin by a
poison victim, a medical evaluation is rarely available to establish
whether an adverse event resulted from interaction between these
substances, as a result of only one of them, as a result of tainted
food, or as result of a chemical exposure the caller may have forgotten
about. So, we don't know how many of these 28 individuals who died ALSO
took a pharmaceutical drug before they got sick, but based on available
data showing pervasive use of OTC and prescription drugs, it isn't
difficult to see that dietary supplements are not the big problem here.

It's important to point out that one subgroup of mortalities in the
data cited is comprised of suicides.  Another subgroup are children who
become victims by accidental exposure, whereas children also represent
at least 50% of all reported poisonings.  Individuals experiencing a
rare but potentially serious allergic reaction is likely to be another.
The last would be a subgroup of persons who did not follow labeling
instructions and experienced a complication from unintentional
overdose.

In summary, the fact that many millions of natural supplements are
consumed each and every day with only a handful of mortalities
*potentially associated with them* is quite astonishing.  Unless you
ignore the medical literature, death by bee sting (40+ deaths per year)
is a more serious threat to the public health than natural supplements.
If the drug industry had a record like this, the FDA would have closed
its doors long ago, saving the taxpayer many billions of dollars, and
also saving millions of lives.  

PeterB