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Important ANZTPA update - News letter no: 28 Hello once again to all our supporters,   Firstly, thanks to all of you that took the time to respond to our request to email your MPs.  The response was so enormous that within a few hours Parliament's server had crashed. Some MPs complained about the number of emails they were getting, but whether they like it or not, that is the voice of democracy in action and if the people who they represent want to tell them how strongly they feel about stopping ANZTPA then they should have every right to do so.   You will be interested to know that over the last few weeks the activity behind the scenes on this issue has been frantic but as usual the Government and Medsafe are only consulting with their supporters so we are relying on our own network of people within Parliament and the industry to pass on relevant information to us.   While we have no confirmation at this stage, what we are hearing is that the Minister intends to put up what she will claim to be a significantly modified proposal including a staged introduction of NZ natural products to the scheme and a package of fee rebates for natural products and medical devices in the short term.  What we strongly suspect is that the package will be presented as if natural health products are not included, trying to look as if she has given the opponents of this scheme what they wanted.  THAT IS NOT TRUE.    This is what you need to remember,     If NZ natural health products are not included initially then their introduction will only have been suspended, likely to be in such a way that bringing them under ANZTPA later would not need to come back to Parliament but could be done by regulation, ministerial order or similar.  In other words, leaving them out at first would be no more than a ruse to get the Bill through the house and then the Government could bring them in later without needing to get the support of any other parties.   Any rebate on fees is insignificant in terms of the total cost to businesses of complying with this heavy handed bureaucracy. Analysis from Australia shows that TGA fees product listing are a tiny percentage of the total compliance costs not to mention the indirect costs of delay in time to market, external consultant fees and the like.   Bringing in natural products as stage two and a period of lower fees would do nothing to address the key reasons ANZTPA will hurt New Zealand's interests.  The scheme is still an Australian based, off-shore regulator and a serious limit on New Zealand's sovereignty in health matters; the scheme is still pharmaceutically based and in our view, pharmaceutically biased and despite meaning higher prices and less choice to consumers there is no increase in consumer safety as a result.  If a scheme doesn't make the public any safer then what justification can there be for it?  It does seem that the only people claiming that this scheme works well for consumers are those desperate to protect their own empire.   You may have seen statements from a group called "Natural Products New Zealand (NPNZ)" a newcomer to the scene.  This group was formed two years ago by Ron Geiger who is a  well known supporter of ANZTPA and is the group's chairman. This body has claimed to support the new package (which only they and other ANZTPA supporters have so far seen) and implicitly claims to do so on behalf of the New Zealand Natural Products industry.     Let us make these things clear;   Despite having heard from some that NPNZ told them they worked with the NZ Health Trust on this - we have not worked with them, we would not work with them and they do not have our support. NPNZ do not represent the NZ natural products industry and they certainly do not speak as a natural products consumers group. Some members of NPNZ that we have spoken with, tell us they do not support ANZTPA and NPNZ's stance on this was not discussed with or approved by them.    By making it appear as if this proposal has the support of industry, NPNZ is keeping alive Minister King's hopes of bringing ANZTPA into being.  If the industry stands united against the proposal, ANZTPA would have no chance of success.   If you are a member of NPNZ and you object to them using the organisation to support the ANZTPA scheme on your behalf, we would encourage you to email us and let us know.   For everyone else, the next few weeks will be very interesting as we work to make sure all parties understand the deception that may be about to be presented to them for their support.  Certainly any opposition party that supports legislation along these lines would be facilitating the very things that they have publicly vowed to oppose and we will encourage all our supporters to hold them accountable. We would not be surprised to see the Government try to introduce this legislation in the busy time leading up to Christmas in the hope that people will be too busy to challenge them and possibly even under urgency or with a very limited timeframe for submissions.   This issue is simply too important to the future of NZ to allow it to be snuck through using these sorts of tactics. Remember, the New Zealand Health Trust and me as its founder have no financial interest in this matter - we have nothing to gain except our desire to see the health freedoms of New Zealand protected for generations to come.  You may like to ask yourself whether other players in this can say the same.   Kind Regards Dave Sloan