Recognizing that dietary supplements play a valuable role in promoting improved health and well-being, in 1994 the Congress enacted a comprehensive new law changing the way in which vitamins, minerals, herbs and specialty supplements are regulated by the federal government. Called the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act (DSHEA), this law gives considerable power to the federal government to ensure the safety of supplements and the accuracy of health claims. At the same time, DSHEA recognized the importance of funding additional scientific studies on the relationship between supplements and disease prevention and created the Office of Dietary Supplements within the National Institutes of Health to coordinate this research.

they founded the DSIB to ensure that the goals of the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act are met by providing meaningful information about the health benefits and responsible use of dietary supplements to all Americans. Because DSHEA set up a new framework for regulating dietary supplements, questions persist about how these products are regulated at the federal level. Accordingly, what follows is a review of the regulations now in place to ensure that only safe, beneficial, and quality supplements are marketed to the American public.

For more information, please visit http://www.supplementinfo.org