Parents be Aware: Health Concerns About Dietary Supplements for Overweight Children

OPENING STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE JAMES C. GREENWOOD
CHAIRMAN, SUBCOMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND INVESTIGATIONS
"PARENTS BE AWARE: HEALTH CONCERNS ABOUT DIETARY SUPPLEMENTS FOR OVERWEIGHT CHILDREN"
JUNE 16, 2004

Reports concerning the increase of obesity in America's children have been broadcast throughout the media in recent weeks and months. The June 7, 2004 issue of Time Magazine has a cover story on obesity problems facing Americans, both young and old. Today the Committee is going to examine the exploitation of parents desperate to find a solution to their children's weight problems. These parents are sometimes persuaded to turn to dietary supplements marketed with the promise of weight loss for their kids. What we have learned from our investigation is that these promises are at best empty and at worst dangerous.

Today, we focus on several products that have been marketed and manufactured for the express purpose of allegedly providing a weight-loss benefit for kids as young as 6 years of age. These products-with names that imply certain weight loss in children-"Skinny Pill for Kids", "Pedia Lean" and "Pedia Loss"- have been represented to America's parents to be safe and effective for weight loss in children. None-I repeat-none of these products has been tested in any scientifically credible manner in children. None of these products has any legitimate basis upon which to claim they would be effective in helping children lose weight. Several of these products also contained ingredients which could be harmful to children.

For example, we have learned that an herb called "uva ursi" was contraindicated for children under 12 years of age-yet this ingredient found its way into a dietary supplement, called "The Skinny Pill for Kids," and was promoted to millions of parents on national television by Edita Kaye. The fact that this product was being marketed at all for children-when it contained an ingredient children should not take-is outrageous. I have watched the tapes of Ms. Kaye and her laboratory formulator defending this product-a product that thankfully a child never ingested-and let me be clear to Ms. Kaye, PAL Labs and anyone else out there who is deciding whether to put an ingredient contraindicated for kids in a product for kids: it is no answer to the American public that "only small amounts" of these ingredients were incorporated in the pills.

The companies that will testify at our hearing today provided false hope and promises to parents and children in the marketing of their respective products. Given the delicate nature of children's health, this type of misleading advertising is even more egregious. One of the dietary supplements for children that the Committee investigated, Pedialean, is still available for purchase today. The fact that 2 of these products-the Skinny Pill for Kids and PediaLoss-I am told, are not being sold anymore in no way changes the larger issues at stake here. These three companies-Edita Kaye and her Fountain of Youth Group, DBS Labs, and Basic Research-promoted and offered for sale products for young children to take by doing little, if any, of their own legitimate research on the health effects of their products on children. Nor did any company even attempt to determine if the product worked before promoting it for purchase! They did this simply to make money at the expense of desperate parents-parents hoping against all hope for a safe and effective magic solution for their children's weight problems. The fact that some of these companies ultimately made little or no money on these products does not alleviate the concern that the rapid rise in childhood obesity will be exploited by dietary supplement manufacturers for monetary benefit.

It is also important to point out that while Edita Kaye's "Skinny Pill for Kids" was pulled before it ever hit the shelves-sparing children around the country ill effects of ingesting this product-and that her national promotional efforts for her product were a year and half ago, she refused to voluntarily cooperate with the Committee's investigation every step of the way. I expect that Ms. Kaye will stand by her statements made on national television that she is happy that the promotional launch of the ill-fated "Skinny Pill for Kids" opened up the debate on this issue of finding a solution to the increasing number of overweight children in the U.S. If Ms. Kaye believes she opened this debate, it is only fitting that she be present at this public forum to continue the debate. I am disappointed that she was not willing to voluntarily aid the committee in our investigation into this matter.

Several agencies have done extensive work relating to obesity in children. I look forward to hearing about the work the Centers for Disease Control have done in this arena and the information they believe is useful to aid parents and their children in combating weight-related problems. The Federal Trade Commission has done extensive work to combat misleading advertising in the dietary supplement industry, and in particular in supplements marketed to children. We know that they recently settled an action with Ms. Kaye regarding her promotional efforts with respect to the Skinny Pill for Kids and other of her products. We look forward to hearing more about this settlement and look forward to hearing about other work the Commission has done in this area. In addition, we are joined by some medical experts who will be able to shed light on some of the problems associated with taking these dietary supplements designed for use by children and the problems that can arise when young children are led to believe there is a magic pill.

I am hopeful that at the end of this hearing, the public-particularly parents-are more informed about what little science and research goes into these products before they are marketed for children. I hope that parents, after hearing testimony today, will turn a skeptical eye towards claims of weight loss from a pill. The uniqueness of this Subcommittee's oversight function is its ability to promote change by providing the public with information. The more information that parents have about these dietary supplements promoted for their children, the more informed will be their decisions regarding their children.