Herbal Medicine regulation in the UK

[Deetee]

If anyone is interested, this was the subject of a British medical Journal editorial this week.
http://bmj.bmjjournals.com/cgi/content/full/331/7508/62

Apparently, "In the United Kingdom the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) is consulting on a proposal for a Herbal Medicines Advisory Committee.12 The MHRA initially proposed a Herbal Medicines Advisory Group that would report to the soon to be established Commission on Human Medicines,13 which in turn would advise ministers on all medicinal products for human use. But the agency now proposes that the Herbal Medicines Advisory Committee—with members representing Western, Chinese, and ayurvedic herbalism, as well as lay members and experts on conventional medicines—should advise ministers directly on the regulation of herbal medicines, thus bypassing the new commission. "

This doesn't seem to be the best way forward to me. To have lay persons and herbalists directly advising ministers is a recipe for disaster. I suspect most of them have had an evidence-base bypass operation at birth, allegedly somewhat like the PM and his allegedly kookoo woo-woo wife...

[richardm]

Can't help but wonder what the lay people are there for...

[Deetee]

Lay persons are co-opted onto increasing numbers of committees and boards nowadays. This is supposed to result in better governance and provide a check on the excessive zeal of doctors and also provide a "user/consumer" perspective. One can see the point with, say, ethics committees having representation, but in order to be seen to be politically-correct the balance can be tipped quite unfavourably (eg before some inquiries and disciplinary investigations the layeity can outnumber the independent medical input by 2:1 - not helpful when most have no grasp of the basic medical principles under investigation.

What use they could provide for a herbal medicine "committee"remains an mystery.