Oh, the Choices…Waxman or Dingell?

You thought all the voting was over? Well, there is a vote in the Democratic party of the House of Representatives this week for various in-house positions. The big vote of note is the showdown between Democrats Henry Waxman (Calif.) and John Dingell (Mich.) for the head of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, which has broad oversight, including food and drug safety and public health (Health and Human Services). Dingell is the current chair, while Waxman has been the chair of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. Neither one has been very supportive of the natural products industry since DSHEA passed. In 2006, after the Democrats took over the majority and, thus, the committee chairs, Dingell said the Energy and Commerce committee would go after dietary supplement regulation and FDA drug safety procedures. Both Dingell and Waxman have worked together in the past to revisit DSHEA and make wholesale changes. With this in mind, it is hard to say which of these two men would be better for our industry, relative to the powers of the Energy and Commerce Committee. Perhaps there's a lesser of two evils, or maybe it's a lose-lose situation for natural products, namely dietary supplements. Time will tell. There is so much on the Congressional plate, there is a chance neither would get to fulfill their dream of turning back DSHEA.